


The Maillard Reaction

by skellerbvvt



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: A Dog Who Loves His Shoe, Ballroom Dancing, Brain Damage, Clothes Porn, Food Porn, M/M, Mal Cobb Lives, Outdated Fandom Tropes, The Arthur/Dom/Mal Not Main Ship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-26 17:02:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 45,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15005360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skellerbvvt/pseuds/skellerbvvt
Summary: Another relic of a comment fic, which was written on the fly comment-by-comment and has not be edited since. Saved from the void by the very good @castillon02 so we can now all enjoy the adventures of Cigar, the world's smallest dog, and his love affair with Shoe. Also, Baker Eames and Steampunk Bistro Waiter Arthur as they pitch woo in any given direction.





	1. Chapter 1

1

On one hand Arthur wore pants like no one on earth should be able to wear trousers. It didn't even compute about how he wore trousers. They weren't skin-tight leather trousers-Eames was more disturbed by that then anything-but they were _very well fitted_ . They didn't stretch over Arthur's arse, oh no, they were specifically designed to encase it so it looked more lush and biteable than Eames’ very best Chocolate Sin Flourless Torte.   
  
Arthur didn't get desserts, he came into Eames' bakery for the Express Reason of getting a dozen sundried tomato bagels every Thursday. On the last Friday of every month he would stop in and get a pie, but Eames understood that it was to bring round home for dinner, and he didn't partake.   
  
"I don't like sweet things," Arthur would say, prim as a cake with that first, untouched layer of buttercream: not a single crumb to ruin the overall penmanship of the mental spatula strokes. And he was always in that state: newly baked, freshly cooled, and just-started to be decorated.   
  
"Oh Darling, it's simply your wretched American upbringing, with those wretched corn syrup monstrosities they give to children." He focused Arthur's attention to the fresh baby cakes, covered in a hard-shell dark chocolate gauche and punched through with a viscous, beautiful raspberry coulis. The cake had a soft, moist crumb-not heavy on the flavor, but a delectable mouthfeel that required a specificity of mixing and bake time.   
  
Arthur would just smile, briefly, and take his large sack of bagels, and Eames would wonder if he ate them all himself. He must, if he only ever got the one flavor. Eames had sixteen different flavors of handmade bagel, and people grabbing them for coworkers always got the full gauntlet. Arthur only ever got the sundried tomato-which Eames paid special, special attention to when it came time to make a new batch. He soaked his tomatoes in hot water and balsamic vinegar, he copped them on a board littered with oregano and basil, then kneaded the dough with minced garlic cloves and sea salt, thinking of Arthur with his weekly dozen bagels and tub of plain cream cheese.   
  
Did he eat them every morning? Was it one of those things he got up for? Did he lie in bed, glaring at his alarm clock and bribe himself up with a freshly toasted bagel with a scrape of white, savory cream cheese. Did he eat them standing up with a cup of coffee? Did he put them together as he dashed out the door? Did he sit down and eat a bagel with a full balanced breakfast with the orange juice and milk that was in every commercial ever?

  


2

"Morning, Arthur." Eames greeted. He had an associate baker who usually ran till because she could sell anything to anyone, and he liked that in a person. One second a customer would be buying a wee bit of cake, the next they were bustling home with three tortes and promise to be by next week for a customized hummingbird three layer for their son's birthday party. She was, in general, extremely useful to have around. Also her fondant architecture was _inspired_ .   
  
"Morning Chef Eames," since Eames was a pastry chef, and _by god_ he'd earned the title, so bitches best recognize. Not that Arthur was a bitch, or anything. Arthur had a New York Times pressed under his elbow, a cup of Small Mom And Pop coffeeshop coffee in his left hand, and his debit card in his right. "I'll just be having my usual."   
  
"You know I have a delightful set of garlic oregano bagels," Eames offered, "I could sneak one in there for you, to try."   
  
Arthur considered this, then shook his head, "I like the ones I'm getting. No need to muck that up."   
  
"I also have some spinach filio pastry puffs, savory instead of sweet, though you really must trust me darling, I could change your mind from those rubbish bit of sugary nonsense that have betrayed you so."   
  
"You just want to show off," Arthur replied, peering behind the counter into the kitchen where Eames had gotten his molding chocolate out to thaw. "Just the regular."   
  
"Your lack of imagination hurts my _soul_ , love. It really does. I apprenticed for eight years under the top pastry chefs in Europe, all just to find the one perfect dessert that would fulfill your life in all the delectably sinful ways it can, and you just want my bagels."   
  
"I'm sorry." Arthur deadpanned.   
  
"You only love me for my boiled breads."   
  
"It's tragic, I know. Give Ariadne my best. Her day off today, is it?"   
  
"She had a big day yesterday. I let her head the cheesecake station." He grinned, which was true. Cheesecake was serious business. Arthur glanced over at the thin, delicate slices of New York style cheese cake, the careful blueberry swirls, the thick, crumbling graham cracker crust. "You should buy one. To show your support."   
  
"I don't like cheesecake," Arthur said, tucking his card away into his black leather conservative wallet.   
  
"You aren't a person, are you? You're a sexy robot from the future who survives off sundried tomatoes and is only here to taunt me."   
  
"It’s all a plot," Arthur nodded seriously, took his bag and nodded, "Have a nice day, Chef Eames."   
  
"I will pine for you, darling. Like an entire field of Christmas trees."   
  
Arthur slipped out the door with a closed lip smirk and Eames made a show of putting his head in his palms and sighing whimsically. Arthur walked down the street and Eames went back to his tea cakes. His tea cakes loved him. He didn't need Arthur, he had wee little balls of corn starch and powdered sugar to melt in his mouth with a hearty sip of Earl Grey. They would be very happy together. Unlike he and pie. He and pie were doomed. Pie was simply too flaky to hold up to his love properly.

  


3

On the other hand, Arthur wore trousers and Eames _never got to see him outside of said trousers_ . The trousers were a deliberate tease, no, worse, a terrifying form of mental torture. They were always there, always perfect fitted, and Eames just wanted to lick up the crease until he got to the fly-which thanks to his unsavory youth-he could open with his teeth. They just followed the line of Arthur's leg with such careful deliberation and Eames was going more than entirely mad that _he didn't get to follow suit._ _  
_ _  
_ "My eyes are up here," Arthur said, deliberating on his monthly pie purchase. Last month he'd gotten pecan, and peach before that, and cherry before that, and winecrisp apple pie before that and...Eames needed to stop knowing every single pie Arthur had ever purchased, because it was embarrassing.   
  
"I know, darling, I've written odes upon odes to the glimmering effervescence of your beauteous orbs. I'm looking for inspiration for my next collection."   
  
"It's rather gouache of you to write poetry about me and not give me the first copy, don't you think?" Arthur scowled into the display case and looked between blueberry and strawberry rhubarb like one of them _might_ explode.   
  
"Who is the pie for, darling? A lover you're seducing with my treats? Seems unfair that you get to feed someone else things that I would be far too pleased to feed you."   
  
"Just a friend," Arthur leaned back, still looking between the two pies. All the other pies Eames had made specifically for Arthur sat unloved and stiff-upper-lipped in the case. He'd gone a bit mad since Thursday, and Ariadne had quietly left him to cut his sexual frustration out in the freezing butter and flour of his pie crust. "He likes baked fruit. I do not."   
  
"How do you not liked baked fruit? It's a staple of the human experience. Humans went OH hey look! Fire! Let's throw things in it and see if it becomes tasty."   
  
"Your job clearly does not keep your mind suitably entertained," Arthur slipped the tip of his thumb under his upper lip and Eames realized that one could forget the entire English language. It was possible to sudden _not know words_ anymore. He knew that they had just been talking, but it suddenly didn't make sense because Arthur's mouth was just so fastidiously _there_ , and Eames' entire life was dedicated to making mouths happy. He was on a mission. A mission from God. And he wanted to make sure that his favorite regular had an extremely happy mouth.   
  
Arthur looked over, and his lips curled up into a smile, before Eames also found out that one could _forget how to breathe_ as well.   
  
Arthur removed his thumb and quietly tapped on the glass over the blueberry pie-fresh blueberries, of course, and singularly selected to be the ripest, plumpest berries of the lot (he'd gone through far too many packages looking for the Champion Berries) mixed with orange and lemon peel, cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice and just a splash of brandy, before being carefully folded into an egg-washed crust. He'd done little cut-outs of leaves on the top crust. He liked the cut-outs. He thought they were whimsical. He also had a little dog cutter, but Arthur had scowled at the tiny dogs prancing around the top of a Treacle pie and Eames had stroked over the golden crust and promised that he still loved the tiny prancing dogs. Yes he did.   
  
"Why buy an entire pie, then? Why not get some tarts?"   
  
"He likes pie." Arthur watched as Eames slid the pie into a box, tied it with a ribbon and gently seated it into a bag.   
  
"Or a tart? I made small pear tarts." He pointed to his small pear tarts. They were small and drizzled with caramel. Ariadne had liked them. She thought they were cute, and had taken one and named it Larry before biting into it with a satisfied munch. Eames would fight to keep her as an associate. In a ring. With his shirt off. He would have a quarrel. He would quarrel with his fisticuffs.   
  
"Well, I hope he likes this one, darling."   
  
Arthur smiled shortly again, paid and walked out the door.

  


4

In the winter, though, Arthur would come in all bundled up in a sweeping coat, a sensible hat, a fuzzy black scarf and warm, flexible gloves. He'd stay inside just that bit longer, peering out of the window at the sharp breezes of teething wind and then back around the comforting confines of Eames' bakery. Eames had rebelled against the sharp-cornered, new age nonsense of high end bakeries that were all sterile steel and ridiculous lamps. A Bakery should have a roaring fireplace, squishy chairs, a lot of tables and ridiculous artwork. Those were the _rules_ .   
  
"You could at least stay and warm up a bit. The wind must blow right through you." Eames tutted, "Really, darling, you are just not eating enough. Come back here, I'll get a cake down you."   
  
"As appetizing as reliving the most disturbing scene in _Matilda_ is, I do have to go to work." Arthur leaned against the counter, knotting his hands together and scowling outside.   
  
"You woo me on purpose, don't you? With your Dahl references, and your fuzzy black scarves. You passed by my bakery and saw me busy with my Hobert and decided that you'd come in here and take me on a whirlwind romance, change my life, and then break my heart by moving to Bornia-"   
  
"Bornia isn't a real country."   
  
"Except then in the last clip of the picture, I'd have left my cruel, unloving career and chose love over muffins."   
  
Arthur took his bag of bagels. "If you are unhappy with your job, Chef Eames, perhaps you should look at another career path instead of depending on me to lighten your life."   
  
"But you're so brilliant," Eames offered, because a leopard can't change his paisley pun-giving spots.   
  
"I'm leaving now, before you can make any more puns," Arthur picked up his bag, took a bracing breath and left out the door. It was probably for the best that Eames wasn't sleeping with him. He would never have gotten out of bed at four in the morning, braved into the cold, terrible world and gotten his bread baking. He would have just said "fuck off" to his bakery and wrapped himself around Arthur until their world was just a tight little haven of sweet, secret warmth. And he really wouldn't have let Arthur leave the bed, would have held him down and kept him there all day and made sure his feet didn't get chilled.   
  
Ariadne peeked out and snapped her fingers at him. He shook his head and went back into the kitchen looking at the rising sweet bun dough with a sigh. "This would be so much easier if I were a prostitute and he was a favored john and we had to work out our differences in montage."   
  
"Is it because then you would have gotten his pants off?"   
  
"It would indeed." Eames agreed and she patted his elbow before doing her cookies. He hefted the twenty pounds of sweet dough out of the Hobert bowl and grabbed his dough cutter, before taking his frustration out with a rolling pin while Ariadne struggled with the Wolf. It was understood between them that the Wolf was haunted. It was equally understood that the Wolf was the best oven out there and they could hide in it during a zombie attack, so they just catered to the Wolf's whims. He'd had her for fifteen years, bought her used, and she never faltered. Just decided that that day was _not a day_ for chocolate chip cookies, and she didn't _care_ if they needed 60 of them, she _wasn't going to do it_ .   
  
So Ariadne made banana bread and Eames wished he could sink his hands into Arthur's hair instead of the plush confines of warm, newly risen dough. And the Thursday wore on.

  


5

And then Arthur comes in on a Tuesday.  
  
_A Tuesday_ .   
  
Eames’ entire life exploded with glitter like he was a three year old in a craft supply closet.   
  
But he was with a friend.   
  
His life hesitantly unexploded with the glitter and poked uncertainly at the macaroni noodles of Woe.   
  
Arthur didn't stop to talk, since Ariadne was at the till and Eames couldn't burst out there and tackle her to the ground for the rights to the counter without giving up his suave, ladykiller exterior, so he watched from behind the Wolf like a creeper as Arthur's _friend_ ordered a cherry tart, and Arthur peered at the menu, and then peered at the display case with the same amount of terrifying focus he always put into Making Choices. If Eames went back in time and met child Arthur in an ice cream store, furiously weighing the pros and cons of cookie dough versus moose tracks he would _never stop taking pictures_ . And they'd lock him away and he'd die instead of getting back to the future, but he would _never stop taking pictures_ , because Arthur little face would have to have been _so very serious_ .   
  
Arthur, eventually, does order a spinach phyllo pastry-and Eames smirks to himself, because his recommendations are _amazing_ , and the spinach has been run through his food processor with sauteed garlic cloves, rich, golden olive oil, sea salt and just a fine chop of basil until fine, folded into the flaky layers of phyllo and baked until the crunchy pastry flakes and melts into thick, savory, rich filling.   
  
Arthur eats delicately, all the crumbs of the phyllo hitting his plate, the filling carefully licked up from the edges and devoured into the warm, coveted confines of his mouth, and Eames _had_ been whipping egg whites for macaroons, but _fuck it_ .   
  
He tries to saunter out, and he feels he mostly succeeds, as he looks around and pretends to just now notice Arthur. Arthur looks up from his baked good and nods at him. "These are good."   
  
"Everything I make is good." Eames shrugs, never having been one of false modesty. Or modesty. In general. As a concept. "But I am delighted you are enjoying it. And how about you?"   
  
"Very nice." Arthur's friend agrees, a streak of cherry on his cheek, crumbs all down his sleeves. Everything about Arthur's friend is subtly out of place, like he took one step to the left of his entire existence and hadn't gotten into the groove of it yet. His shirt was buttoned and tucked, but the collar was a mess and it was wrinkled...oddly. His trousers didn't quite fit, but they didn't...quite...not fit, and his jacket was...rumpled like he didn't know how to wear one. It was all somewhat perplexing, honestly.   
  
"Dominic Cobb. Arthur brings me your pie."   
  
Stupid pie eating friend.   
  
Eames grinned and shook his hand. "Arthur talks so much about you."   
  
Mr. Cobb snorted, "Arthur doesn't talk about anyone."   
  
"No, really, he goes on. It's precious. He's always so worried about which pie to bring you. Our conversations go on for hours. Do you get him to eat any of it."   
  
Cobb then looked down at his plate. "The, uh...pie isn't for me. Exactly. It's um...it's for a mutual..." He trailed off, and squinted down at his hands.   
  
The pie conspiracy grew ever larger and stranger. Arthur adjusted the napkin tucked into his shirt collar and Eames knew when a moment got awkward, and thus quickly pulled a conversational U-Turn and offered to get them some coffee.   
  
"Smooth," Ariadne noted.   
  
He didn't say anything. just them their coffee, talked pointedly about how the weather sure was weathering something fierce, and then retreated into his kitchen and looked down at his biscuit dough morosely and wondered if there was even a point to monkey bread anymore. Life was too bleak for monkey bread.   
  
"Go put on a colorful shirt, write a sad poem in your journal, and if you need special bathroom time, I won't say anything."   
  
"I'm the boss." He continued staring at the dough.   
  
"Yes, of course, you're the boss, now go find comfort in ugly clothing while I make monkey bread."

  


6

Some people drank. Others watched too much telly. Eames comforted himself by going into the Thrift stores and plucking out the brightest colored clothing in the entire place. He'd go to normal stores, but normal stores insisted on being dull and monochrome. He liked colors. He liked bright, plentiful colors all over everything. It was comforting.  
  
He had to wear his orange and pink cotton jumper under his chef's coat, but he didn't work in a 700-cover kitchen with two Wolfs, the stove and a Salamander blaring heat in addition to a flat top and a grill. He'd been there. He'd done that. He'd nearly died of heat exhaustion. Kitchens were bloody insane.   
  
  
He took off early for the night and flopped around his flat in his brightly patterned robe and fuzzy slippers, his entire flat smelling like cloves and unwashed socks. Stupid Arthur. Stupid Arthur and his pie orgies. Stupid Arthur and using _Eames'_ pie for his pie orgies. Stupid Arthur for not _inviting Eames_ to his debauched pie-filled sex evenings.   
  
Realistically there were probably not any pie orgies, but he felt off-kilter and grumpy and he could let his mind roam the wilds of Arthur Covered In Simple Syrup if he wanted to. He could do that. He could spread soft ganache thick up the line of Arthur's spine, he wanted to get out his pastry bags and all of his tips and decorate Arthur back and legs in cream cheese frosting, in buttercream and hard sugar. He wanted to make perfect little flowers on his piping pins and drop them over Arthur's shoulders.   
  
He wanted to make rosettes out of hard rum sauce and let them melt between Arthur no-doubt firm and fiercely individualized arsecheeks and them lick him clean. He wants to drizzle him with vanilla bean sauce and brush him with browned butter and eat him up and over and clean until he was just crumbs on Eames' bed.   
  
And then Eames would just make him all over again.   
  
But no. He couldn't let his mind roam there, because it wasn't real. And in his profession, if he dreamed up something, he could always make it. It would always be a thing-temporary, yes, but an object. He could dream this until he got hyperglycemic and it wouldn't do any good, because Arthur would come in on Thursday and not Eames' to lick and bite and test over and over for firmness and balance of crust and crumb.

  


7

He had other regulars, he even had other regulars he was incredibly fond of. The reason he'd opened a small bake shop instead of going into the much more lucrative commercial baking industry (Though that would kill your life-75+ hours a week, every week? That would kill a man), or a exclusive more artsy avant garde micro-gastronomy pinnacle of culinary delight, was that he wanted _regulars_ , he wanted people who came in every day for their morning muffin, he wanted the people who only brought their sourdough from him, the people who waited for the bread slicer to give them their two loaves of perfectly cut, nut-brown multi-grain bread, the couples sharing a slice of cake, the children with cupcake frosting all over their faces.   
  
He liked laughing over the counter, or hearing Ariadne chatting while he rolled out, cut and stamped an endless troupe of sugar cookies for a child's second grade class' consumption. He liked hearing familiar voices, and knowing what tortes to make for what day, and when he should decorate his cupcakes with thick spirals of bright pink frosting, thin ships of spun sugar, and confetti sprinkles because the two homeschooled twins were coming in and getting their Just Finished A Math Quiz reward. He liked, in essence, people. He liked knowing them, took pride in recommending the one confection in the store that would really get their gut going. He liked watching the way people approached a seven layer chocolate dream, or crunched into a light, airy meringue, or how they ordered the treat they'd clearly been thinking about all day.   
  
But Arthur didn't come in to treat himself. He came in and was practical-bought his breakfast and a monthly pie and that was it. He, up until that Tuesday, never indulged, never looked to need indulgence.   
  
"I'm going to lunch."   
  
Ariadne looked up from her crossword. 10 to 12 was a long stretch of Nothing for the most part-the rush times were 7-9 and 3-5, the rest of the day had trickles of business, enough that it wasn't worth it to close down, and Eames generally got all of his prep work done during the slow time, but mostly he and Ariadne played koosh ball basketball in-between bake times. "You never go out for lunch."   
  
"Going to lunch is a thinly veiled excuse for going out on a walk in order to take my mind off obsessing."   
  
"Ah," She nodded, "I'll hold down the fort."   
  
He tugged on his coat and slumped out of the warm comfort of his shop and went down the sidewalk. He had secured a nestled little place on Main St, so the rest of the street was a long of quiet, comfortable little shops that the town wanted tourists to see. He hung a left onto Wallace, because while most of the places were nice, he'd eaten at all of them when Ariadne rushed out to grab him a cup of malt-cheddar mushroom soup from _Spoons_ two shops down, or a double decker chipotle chicken club from _The Copper Quince_ or an open-faced ricotta-and-hazelnut butter sandwich from that place downtown with the lions outside the doors when Ariadne was in the mood for their avocado brie-and-bacon wrap.   
  
He tucked his hands in his pockets as he strolled past the city-kept greens and diligent landscaping of a few of the outside-dining cafes, all going brown as winter encroached and sat on top of the buildings, settling down on them with obsessive, harsh breathing. Eames despised the cold, but it was a fact of life that bakeries did better in the winter than in the summer, so he could hardly go anywhere that was summer all the time. It was a retirement plan, in any case.   
  
There were a few themed restaurants down Wallace-not a whole lot in the city at large-mostly for kids. The typical Princess and Unicorns and Knights type of places, nothing that really committed to the ideal other than a few smelly mascot costumes and fancy wallpaper.

  


8

But Eames had a nose for those sorts of things, and he stopped outside one of the small, historical buildings that were around the Wallace-Lestrange area of the city. The places where parts of the roads were still made of brick, and the buildings were all sturdy, determined works of sensible 1800's architecture. There was nothing outside the building that drew his attention, save the wooden sign dangling from a copper-alloy post in the doorway declaring the whatever was inside was called _Gears_ . Eames peered at the heavy wooden door, and then back at the sign.   
  
There was nothing about it that said it was a restaurant of any sort, which Eames thought was bad business, but every city needed that one little hole-in-the-wall place that you get indoctrinated into only after a friend-of-a-friend stumbled upon it looking for cover from a rainstorm. It's a city-wide secret, something they keep from tourists and college students. Something just for the people who have set down roots and need a little spice in their relationship with their town. Like the pair of fuzzy handcuffs under the marital bed for some lazy Saturday evening.   
  
Eames pushed into the door and was immediately pleased he did.   
  
There is a certain smell a good restaurant cultivates, prunes it like foliage and waters and feeds until it sinks into the pores of the lacquered tables, and sinks deep into the fibers of curtains and carpet and upholstery. Eames knew some bakers who burned carefully selected oils to thicken the spicy-tart aroma of their pies and cookies, a few others that washed the tables with a thin layer of cinnamon, letting the oils sink deep into the wood, before wiping it off again, tempering their furniture over years until the entire establishment is salivary without a single oven running.   
  
There was a certain smell that was held together by a careful, vicious selection of cleaning supplies, and conditioned baking pans and years and years of browning butter and cooking sugar, and the endless combination of flour and everything else on the planet. It grew into a different, multi-headed beats when there were soups on order, when sandwiches and coffee tangled with the aromas, until one couldn't distinguish cooked apples, from fried bacon, from fresh bread, from the crisp of lettuce, arugula, watercress, cucumber, tomato, parsley.   
  
You could inhale a good restaurant, let it live in your lungs and settle in like the warm, comforting burn of a long-craved cigarette, or that first snap of autumn, or the soppy-sweet just-rained smell. Eames closed his eyes and inhaled, just one long breath let out through his mouth, over his tongue and it was indulgent and extravagant. He could scent au jue, pulled pork, smoked salmon, freshly fried chips, sherry, malt, balsamic and red wine vinegar, oregano, basil, parsley, rosemary, curry, cumin, celery leaves and dill, the sizzle of bacon, the drip of roast, and the beautiful soft fragrance of fresh, crusty, soft bread.   
  
It took him a long, an _indecently_ long time to open his eyes, and he was glad he ascertained that this place knew what it was doing before he got a good look around.   
  
Most theme restaurants can't tell their arse from their whisk when it came to decent food. They put some banners up and thought that was an excuse to get pre-frozen shepherd pies and chips so flat and mealy they weren't worth consuming.   
  
"This would be the only way you could run a Bistro and still wear a suit, isn't it?" He asked, and Arthur smiled from behind the long, elegant oak and rosewood counter, the tables around them intricate curly-ques of crafted copper, the glasscases behind his scripting out the menu, and Arthur himself in a bold, cranberry red double breasted vest, a coachmen's hat perched over his brow, and his ridiculous trousers still the high waisted, flat-front, subtly striped, belt-loop-less black wool held up with sharp, smart leather bracers and a high stand detachable collar slung close with a elegantly tied black cravat.

  


9

Eames had never wanted to bite anything more in his life.  
  
"Do you have a fob watch?"   
  
Arthur stood and there was the gold chain, slung from the clip to his pocket. "I also have a walking stick, a coat and deerskin gloves, but I'm not going out today."   
  
"You never dress like that around me."   
  
"Thursday is my day off." Arthur shrugged. The design around them was dark color scheme, heavy brocade curtains and the clocks were clearly hand-crafted. Not originals, Eames didn't think. A skilled hobbyist, then, maybe. Maybe Arthur. Likely Arthur. Probably Arthur. It was lit with an elegant chandelier, the cabinets were hefty, thick beats of rosewood, and in the carefully modified modern lighting Eames could see discreet, stenciling around the border. The floor was parquet, with a few heft oriental rugs placed near the heavy brocaded chairs.   
  
"Victorian style bistro. Very nice."   
  
"Ah," Arthur held up a finger, "Not quite." He pointed to the men's bathroom. Eames turned and went in.   
  
He came out shortly and stared at the subtly smirking Arthur. "You have an airship design. Your bathroom is an _airship_ . You have a _steampunk bistro_ ."   
  
"I am honestly surprised you know what that is," Arthur noted.   
  
"You have a _clockwork robot_ ." Eames peered back in the door. "Does he do anything?"   
  
"Warms towels mostly. He works though. The eyes light up and everything."   
  
"You have a _clockwork robot towel warmer_ ." Eames repeated, his heart so full of something he couldn't even handle it. "You made it, didn't you? You made the clockwork towel warmer. You looked at your life and decided that you needed warm towels and they needed to be warmed by a _clockwork robot_ ."   
  
"Cobb, actually, decided that it needed to be a robot. I mostly made clocks and watches. Hobby, for the most. One can hardly make a career out of watchbuilding these days. Music boxes and the like as well, a lot of theme faires, and then I met up Yusuf who can cook and..." Arthur gestured around them, then went to rubbing down the already spotless rosewood.   
  
"You _run counter_ for a _Steampunk bistro_ with a cook named _Yusuf_ ." Eames repeated. "Pet, every time I think it is not even possible for you to get more delightful, you somehow manage it."   
  
"Can I get you anything?"   
  
Eames plopped down into a chair, "Why don't your surprise me?"   
  
Arthur pushed back from the counter and sauntered back into the kitchen through a swinging door. The kitchen, of course, would have to comply with FDA and USDA standards, and those bastards hadn't an ounce of whimsy to them.   
  
Arthur took a bit, then arrived back with a tray, walking around the counter with ease, the step of his black, well-heeled lace up boots easy and sure, as he lowered it down and placed a small cup of tomato bisque, with a crusty, warm slice of baguette perched on the side and a sprig of parsley resting on top of the thick soup. He then seated a plate with two thick triangles of sandwich on hefty pieces of rich, white potato bread, and thick golden potato wedge chips that smelled like they were first sauteed in a dark ale before fried. Arthur seated a wire basket of condiments in the middle of his table, snapped open a sharp white linen napkin, and then, without a word, tucked it into Eames' collar. His fingers were warm, dexterous as they seated the cloth about his neck, dragging slow along the column of his throat before retreating and placing a small red bliss potato salad between the soup and the sandwich.   
  
"No dessert?"   
  
"Yusuf only bakes bread," Arthur said, placing a roll of silverware onto the table, even though the bisque already had a gorgeous silver soup spoon perched across the rim. "We do, however, have sixteen different flavors of house-churned ice cream, and a daily baked pudding."

  


10

"Is the ice cream machine clockwork?"  
  
"Children generally enjoy watching it work. We make the ice cream for the week on Saturdays, and give our free samples to anyone in the store who looks even slightly excited about the idea of ice cream."   
  
Arthur straightened from his sideways curl, and walked back to behind the counter, clicking on a roped off gramaphone as he went by, that scratched before the discretely hidden speakers about the store played a chipper Viennese waltz and Eames suspected the gramaphone switch was hooked up to an iPod.   
  
A perfect tomato bisque was light and succulent, perfect for dipping a crackling crust of baguette into it. It had none of the bitter, tart acidic tang of tomato, but all of the juicy sweetness. Eames dipped the spoon in, and the bisque burst over his tongue with small, liquefied chunks of carrot, the sharpness of celery and onion, the subtle weave of garlic tangled with salt and just a hint, a tease of sherry. He closed his eyes as he swallowed and breathed out. When combined with the yeasty textured tug of bread it reached something transcendental, creamy and textured, and nothing resembling the flat, watery, sugary atrocity of canned tomato soup.   
  
Arthur was watching him as he ate, quiet and respectful of the food and Eames licked his lips as he finished the far-too-small cup of soup and turned to the sandwich. He drizzled the chips with malt vinegar and a dash of salt and pepper before crunching into one. It had a light, crisp crust and the smooth, softness of excellent prepared potato. Not mealy, not airy, tangy with vinegar and sweet with ale, the taste of the crust melting into the richness of golden potato and he never wanted to eat _any other chips_ for the _rest of his life_ .   
  
But the sandwich. Oh. But the sandwich. Eames was so often utterly disappointed with sandwiches, with their balloon bread Wonder casing that fell apart after three unsatisfying crunchy bites, limp lettuce dropping down over the crumbling toast, slimy, tiny cuts of tomato and burnt minuscule stripes of meat along with far too much mayonnaise. They weren't even worth ordering half the time.   
  
But this. This was art. This was something to be cherished. The bread was thick, properly thick, at least three-quarters inch of lightly toasted, fragrant, chewy-thick-soft bread. The sort of bread that had been baked in an oven instead of with steam jets, the sort of bread you could _hear_ was done when you tapped a knuckle against the smooth, golden top.   
  
Oh and the bacon, the bacon was a thick, glorious culmination of properly crisp applewood smoked bacon-not too greasy or salty or dry- layered with fresh, thick, sweet grilled tomatoes and crisp _goddamn crisp and fresh and crunchy_ lettuce and watercress, so fresh it shivered as he bit into it, and the flavors held apart them crumbled together into some sort of ritualistic orgy of _fucking delicious_ that he decided that this sandwich, this sandwich with the exact right amount of mayonnaise, and oh Lord, was that Brie? The slightest sample of Brie hidden under the top layer of toast, smoothing out the sharp-salt-sweet-crunch of the entire expirence into...he didn't even know. He wanted to make love to that sandwich. He wanted to have gorgeous, bacon fueled sex with that sandwich, he wanted have tiny half sandwich half Eames monstrous babies with that sandwich. Their love was real. Their love was so, fucking real.   
  
And Arthur just watched, just stood behind the counter and _watched_ him eat, didn't say a word, didn't try and make conversation, just left Eames alone with his chips and his sandwich and the _salad_ , oh dear the salad was the refreshing acidic lift after the comforting, happy Sunday-morning doze of the BLT and Eames closed his eyes and, momentarily, did not know which way was up. He was stuffed, he was _full_ , he never wanted to move again, just relax into the food in his belly and yet he wanted to go to the bathroom, throw up and come out and _eat it again_.

  


11

Arthur came over and set a small, a small _tiny_ little scoop of pistachio ice cream for him and Eames ate it. He ate it in two bites and he didn't know _how he fell more in love_ with that meal _but he fucking well managed it_ .   
  
"You get all of your bagels for free. All of them." Eames insisted. "If you try and give me money I will sneak it back into your wallet. You get _all the bagels you can stand_ for free."   
  
Arthur picked up the edge of Eames’ napkin and swept at the corner of his mouth, removing a dab of tarragon. Eames licked at the spot and watched Arthur watch him. There was a simmering moment, where everything seemed possible, and then they remembered that Arthur still had to front through his lunch rush-no doubt to start trickling in any moment-and Ariadne would sort of mince-pie Eames if he was gone much longer.   
  
"Don't even think of getting out your wallet." Arthur said, quiet, and Eames swallowed.   
  
"Can you dance?" Eames asked, sudden, like another part of his brain was doing all the words now so the rest of him could carve the line of Arthur's neck into his memory like he was going to be locked away from humanity for the rest of his existence, and he needed one last image to drag down with him. If were to be abandoned on a desert island, his memory erased except for one, single, crystalline image (and thing necessary for survival) it would be Arthur's neck at that moment, long and pale and lit until all it was was skin and shadows. Or maybe it wouldn't be. He knew he'd take some facet of Arthur when he went, though.   
  
Eames might have read far too much soppy romantic tripe in his formative years, but he was _very sincere_ about his soppy tripe.   
  
Arthur frowned, "Dance? Like..."   
  
"Like this," Eames nodded to the quick one-two-three-four of the waltz playing, "Do you know how to dance?"   
  
"I know how to lead," he offered uncertainly and Eames bounced up and placed his hand on Arthur's upper arm, then settled his palm into Arthur's. Arthur paused a long moment before straightening that final inch, squaring his shoulders and placing his hand on Eames up back, finishing their waltz frame. Eames had to look strongly away and bend his back, but he was fine with that fact that he was hardly making the correct lines that a willowy dance partner would.   
  
They moved around the tables, Eames hopping from one train-track to the other, following as Arthur lead them through turns, keeping everything simple and close. Arthur was grinning at him, then lifting his chin and pretending that it was terribly serious. Eames followed suit, and when he turned and saw that a family was politely standing in the doorway and watching he hinted with a bob of his head. Arthur turned them once more and he then decided to lead Eames through a single three point spin, before ending them in a slightly exaggerated waltz pose.   
  
Arthur swept forward with a bow and then lead them to a table before falling into a Cockney accent as thick as sleep and equally as unpredictable, and Eames slipped out the door without another word.

  


12

Eames had a plan. He had a plan he planned all by himself. It was a plan. A scheme, mayhaps, a ploy, a plot, an _idea_ . Arthur came by for bagels on Thursday. Thursday was his day off. Thursday was the day Arthur put away his steampunk clothing, and slunk into his lower-waisted, primly pressed, equally well fitting trousers. And the shirt, oh yes, his dress shirts were always so crisp, and his jackets and his vests and bracers and...Eames wanted to understand all his layers. All of them and sink his teeth in and see if he crumbled like phylo or slid like cake, or if he were his own strange sort of beast. He did want to bite though. And take him dancing. They rather needed to go dancing. Arthur would be beyond fetching in a fedora.   
  
It just took a mild amount of stalking to find out that Arthur lived in a small flat about his steampunk bistro, and a few chats with his _very nice neighbors_ who were old and pleased with a platter of cookies and a British accent, were spilling every ounce of information about Arthur they had accumulated thus far.   
  
"You'll be a good friend," the old lady said squeezing his forearm, "That darling needs friends. And food. I just don't understand how he can be around food all day and be such a tiny thing. I just don't understand. He's such a _tiny_ thing, and he's just so pale. That dear needs some sun."   
  
Her husband nodded like he had no idea what was going on and Eames complimented the old ladies' crochet pattern and she smished his face between her hands and said "Europeans just have such good manners, don't they Charles. Look at him, I bet he writes all sorts of things to his mother. And you get out in the sun. Look at you. You must get that dear tiny thing into the sun, he's just so _pale_ . It's sickly."   
  
Eames just nodded and escaped, eventually, with Lacy's secret family recipe for molasses cookies, and full knowledge of when Arthur would be afoot the following Thursday.   
  
So he put on his favorite violently purples jumper, jumped into his best olive green trousers, and slipped into his lucky powder blue shoes, before setting out to stand in front of Arthur's door with a dozen sundried tomato bagels in a move that would either be perceived as creepy or romantic. Eames figured as long as he had bagels it was fine. Bagels made everything _fine_ .   
  
Arthur left his flat around 7 o clock to go down to Eames’ bakery and pick up his bagels. From there Eames didn't know what he did, but he knew he was the first stop in Arthur's day.   
  
Arthur left his flat right on time, stopped and peered at Eames in his stairwell.   
  
"You do delivery now?"   
  
"Only for very special regulars." He lifted the bag.   
  
Arthur carefully took the bag from Eames and then turned to his lock and opened the door right back up again. Then he paused, looked inside his flat, looked at Eames and nodded to himself, grabbed Eames' coat and dragged him inside.

  


13

From the moment Eames was pulled into the doorway, his brain neatly stuffed away any and all expectations of anything. He was going to be a free bird, he was just going to rock to Arthur's roll, zig to Arthur's zag, bass to Arthur's badass lead guitar. No, wait, Eames was likely drums and Arthur was bass. He didn't know who was their frontman, lead guitar or celloist (all good bands _should_ have a cello) but he was suddenly rather sure it wasn't him.   
  
Anyways.   
  
Arthur could be dragging him inside to show Eames his model train. He could be dragging Eames inside because he'd suddenly remembered his top secret agent group had released a deadly toxin that only effected British bakers. He could...have a preciously small dog.   
  
"You have the tiniest dog in the world," Eames noted, as the wee dachshund wiggled over in an ecstasy of tiny excitement and stood on top of Arthur's shoe. He didn't even manage to get to Arthur's knee, and Arthur bent, automatically to scoop him up. "I could put that dog in a box and not even need to pay extra postage. What's his name?"   
  
"Cigar," Arthur said as Cigar nuzzled all up in his face like he was doggy nirvana, and Eames couldn't blame him. There wasn't an ounce of him available to lay blame. He'd be doing that right then if it was in any way acceptable. "As in, give the man a...."   
  
Cigar, it seemed, was perfectly used to be toted around Arthur's flat like a briefcase, and flopped over Arthur's arm as Arm placed the bagels in a specially slotted breadbox. Arthur had a bagel box. He had a box specifically designed to hold bagels. Arthur probably also had a closet just for his normal wear, and another for his job, and he slept on one side of the bed when it was cold and another when it was hot. And he'd do like the telly said and have one cutting board for meat and the other for vegetables.   
  
"I...usually would take Cigar for a walk now," Arthur said, as Cigar sniffed in Eames direction in a deliberate "What is this? Who is that? Is he food? Can I eat him? Will he bring love? Is he love?" and Arthur just patted Cigar wiggling excited body. "Do...I mean, would you like..." He coughed. "We're going to Wilson Park."   
  
"Is that an invitation?"   
  
"Cigar will try to ride on your shoe. He's very lazy," Arthur non-answered and Eames beamed.   
  
"I would be delighted." And was handed the wiggling coffee brown puppy as Arthur went to get his walking collar and leash. He had a special walking collar. He had a collar _just for walkies_ .   
  
"This collar detaches easily, in case he gets caught on something. The walking collar doesn't." Arthur defended and waggled Cigar's ears. "He gets into everything."   
  
"A dog after my own heart."   
  
Arthur clipped on the leash and took Cigar back, nestling him in the crook of his elbow and Eames opened the door with a flourish, "My good man."   
  
"Quite so good chap," Arthur replied, dry as smoking ice, and stepped out down the stairs, Eames following behind and give the door a slight push to make sure it was locked.   
  
The second they got outside, though Cigar looked around like the world had suddenly gotten _too big_ and he whined and stuck his face into Arthur's elbow.   
  
"Does he-" Eames nodded.   
  
"He does. He's usually fine once we get to the park. As long as there aren't any overly large dogs or geese there."   
  
"Geese are vicious." Eames agreed. "Likely to run off with your bollocks if you don't keep clear."   
  
"Elegantly put."   
  
"I thought so."   
  
Cigar continued to pout into Arthur's arm and Arthur scratched him behind the ears and Eames sudden wished for a device with which to shrink himself. Or turn himself into an impossibly small dog. One of those.

  


14

Cigar did try and ride on his shoe. For the first ten minutes at the park he got very excited and ran around to see everything, Arthur patiently following along as Cigar sniffed everything, and had a tug of war with a cattail for a minute before getting distracted by movement in the long grass. But then he suddenly got tired and he sort of flopped over the crown of his lucky powder blue's and then hung on with his little teeth embedded in the laces. Eames didn't mind, as it meant Arthur had to stick close to him and keep an eye on Cigar.  
  
"He's like a toddler," Eames said, "One second he's _go, go, go_ and then next he's sleeping on your shoe. How old is he anyways?"   
  
"Eight months. Yusuf got him because his sister breeds dogs, and then he realized he shouldn't have a dog."   
  
"Why?"   
  
"He's sort of crazy," Arthur peered down the long pavement path of Wilson park, the long one that looped lazily through alcoves of trees that looked like they should be in calendars, before circumventing Wilson Lake and then heading back to the playground. "Experimental type, always has stuff that might explode going on. Bad place for a curious dog. So I took him."   
  
"Why...does your chef..."   
  
"He does that avant garde experimental stuff that people pay 6000 dollars for and have to book a reservation four year in advance."   
  
Eames just stared at him and Arthur shrugged, bent down, and hoisted a wiggling Cigar up. "He falls in love with shoes. I don't know why he'd like yours, but he has poor taste."   
  
"First you won't eat my baked goods, and now you insult my shoes. Your commentary is always appreciated, Arthur."   
  
"Chef Eames, you are lucky I didn't set you on fire when I saw you," Arthur scowled fiercely at him. "How can you even survive wearing that?"   
  
"I like colors."   
  
"I'm sorry to say that they don't like you back." Arthur tickled under Cigar’s chin and Cigar completely melted into Arthur's palm. Eames was so jealous he could have expired, right there. Right there in the park. Just gone and kicked it. He could have. Really.   
  
Eames, instead, chose to tuck his hands into his favored olive green baggy trousers. "Well at least I'm trying, what are you? Trying to blend into a Buster Keaton movie? Hope no one will notice you're in color? Should we do a prat fall right here?"   
  
"Would you listen to that, Cigar? There's a colorblind British man who thinks he's funny. Do you think he's funny?"   
  
Cigar sneezed.   
  
Arthur nodded at him seriously.   
  
"You _named your dog Cigar_ ," Eames said, "and you're making fun of me."   
  
"You've sunk so low." Arthur agreed.   
  
"Why did you name him Cigar, anyways?" Eames asked, figuring it had something to do with Cigar being the _tiniest dog alive_ , brown, long and narrow.   
  
"Don't analyze, Chef Eames. Sometimes a cigar is just a Cigar."   
  
Eames quietly stopped walking and turned around and went the other direction. "I'm sorry darling, it's been fun, but I cannot associate with you anymore."   
  
"Whatever will I do without my carbohydrate obsessed stalker?"   
  
"Expire, darling. Expire." Eames continued walking and then stopped when a rumbling jingle alerted him that Cigar was flailing towards him. Or his shoes, rather. Arthur wasn't kidding when he said his dog fell in love with them. Cigar was staring soulfully at his laces and then up at Eames.   
  
"Arthur, your dog needs to make an honest pair out of my shoes."   
  
"Both of them?"   
  
"Well you can hardly expect me to separate them. They'll pine away to nothing. Or is your dog not man enough to handle the curves on my shoes."   
  
Cigar climbed up and bit down on the left one's tongue and Eames looked up. "Look, they're snogging. He's far too young for this sort of play."   
  
"It's not my fault your shoe is a cougar. How old are those? At least four times his age."   
  
"I blame his parenting." Eames tutted.   
  
"You've got a line for everything, don't you." Arthur stared at him a long moment and Eames looked down at Cigar loving on his lucky shoes.   
  
"So do you."   
  
"At least we'll never be bored," Arthur finished, tucked the handle of the leash into Eames pocket and began walking. "Come on and buy me ice cream."

  


15

Eames had felt a bit foolish asking Arthur for drinks. He felt he should have had something in his hat, something better than that. Something...fascinating, complex and intelligent. But he spent most of his week working, as did Arthur, and so he honestly couldn't think of anything better. Not off the top of his head, right there, in the park, with Cigar licking pecan ice cream off his shoe, and Arthur fastidiously working on his all natural sugarless fruit pop.  
  
"You'd tell me if you were diabetic and my insistence on you eating desserts is akin to asking you to go fuck yourself, wouldn't you?"   
  
"I just don't like sweet things." Arthur shrugged, "Never have. Don't even like sugar in my coffee."   
  
"But you'd tell me. I do so hate being unintentionally crass. I rather my crassness be a purposeful self-directed strike."   
  
"I would." Arthur finally agreed and Eames had nodded and gone back to his ice cream.   
  
Anyways. Eames had asked him out for a drink, and Arthur had agreed like it was simply a natural progression of their conversation. But then, Eames considered, he hadn't specified _where_ they could go for drinks. Location was what mattered.   
  
"Ariadne, you're young and hip." Eames turned to her and she looked up from her pastry bag briefly, before returning to the careful stripes of ladyfingers for her [ tiramisu](http://www.grouprecipes.com/93697/basic-tiramisu-from-the-culinary-institute-of-america.html) . "Why is it that youngsters go off to impress their date enough to shag, but they don't actually go and shag there."   
  
"You finally got a date with Arthur, did you?"   
  
Eames took this as an opportunity to show her the pictures of Cigar he had shot with his phone, and she flailed as elegantly as one can flail about an impossibly tiny dog riding on a powder blue shoe whilst one is holding a pastry bag.   
  
"Suddenly the fact that you're making dog treats makes so much more sense."   
  
Eames beamed proudly down at his leaf shaped dog treats. It was that or shape them like dogs, and while the idea of Arthur's ridiculously tiny dog eating a somehow _even smaller dog_ was precious in Eames head, Arthur might find that morbid. And then one of them would make the obvious pun and they'd have to shoot themselves.   
  
"What are we going to do with the rest of the beef stock?" She questioned and Eames shrugged. "Make more dog biscuits, sell them to people. People have dogs. People like their dogs. They should buy them treats."   
  
Ariadne frowned as she considered this. "We could have all sorts. We could have some dipped in white chocolate, and have chicken stock and..." She turned and went back to her ladyfingers, because Ariadne was a thinker. She liked to bake and think. Eames was pleased that no doubt they would soon have an entire sampler of treats for people's dogs (oh, they could do organic stuff. People loved organic stuff.) but his question had not been answered.   
  
And then, suddenly, it was. Eames carefully worked his spatula under the still hot biscuits and preened to himself about his imagination.   
  
His apartment building had an accessible green roof. And not just the normal, boring American green roof with sedum, no, but an intensive care garden roof that had a nice view of Snail Lake to one side, and the diligent architecture of their city on the other. And by accessible, Eames meant he knew how to pick locks (thanks, again, in part, to his seedy youth, but unrelated to how he learned to open zippers and buttons with his teeth or learned to ballroom dance or bake). If he brought a blanket and a wireless, electric heater along with a bottle of... but what did Arthur drink? Nothing sweet. Something that would be good with his spinach phyllo. Savvignon Blanc was a bone dry white wine good for spinach. Arthur seemed a white wine type.   
  
Eames whistled as he put the biscuits on a cooling rack.

  


16

Arthur did not like white wine. He did, however, like the black label blended Scotch Eames had toted along as a back-up plan. The white wine sat unopened, chilling on the sod as he and Arthur looked out over the lake.  
  
Arthur had gotten under the blanket with Eames with a distinct "I know what you're doing." look and Eames had just kept his expression as fastidiously innocent as he could manage. But it was warm under their blanket, Arthur wasn't quite leaning into him, but neither was he moving away. Arthur had pulled out his iPod and gave one earbud to Eames, while saving the other for himself, Rosemary Clooney trickling out as Arthur tapped his foot against the plush, but dying, grass. The spinach phyllos were that hint more excellent then they had ever been before.   
  
"The bagels got better too." Arthur had said, peering down at his pastry. "I noticed."   
  
"I would be world renown for my abilities if you ate everything I made."   
  
Arthur huffed and looked around the garden. "Must be something spectacular in the spring."   
  
Eames didn't say that Arthur should see it, but he wanted to. He wanted to take Arthur's elbow up the stairs when the crabapple trees and buckeyes bloomed. One wall was lined with lilac bushes, and Eames wanted to...wanted Arthur to see it, was all. Just wanted to know that Arthur would be around to see it.   
  
Arthur knelt up and Eames followed so as not to dislodge the earbuds, and he tucked the iPod into his front pocket, before pulling Eames to him, not a word exchanged, and Eames couldn't feel the heat of him, not with the thickness of their coats, but they were the only two people who could hear the music, they were the only two people on the roof, and his gut was warm with the Johnnie Walker, and he didn't mind if Arthur led. He didn't really mind at all, as long as they were going to the same place. He thought to say as much, but bit that one down too, because they promenaded between dying flower beds, and turned around the careful, bare arches of the trees, and when one song ended, and a foxtrot slid in to replace it, well, their line of dance didn't change, just the pattern of their footwork. He was thankful that Arthur had, apparently, learned International style in his dances. American style let the follower and leader break apart, but not so with International.   
  
It was a slow dance, 4/4 time, and while Arthur's footwork was immaculate (why wouldn't it be?) and he was an excellent leader, they didn't do anything fancy. Eames hadn't danced follow in years.   
  
"And then it was in heels, no less." He added when he said as much and Arthur had gazed down his corduroys with a considering look.   
  
"I'd say you have the legs for it, but with those pants, I honestly don't know."   
  
"If you ever want to see my legs, Arthur, all you have to do is ask." They'd fallen into a slow, side-to-side foot change and Arthur nudged his hip into a turn and Eames went with it.   
  
"You know, I'd put out tonight, if you asked." Arthur said, when they were back under the blanket, taking small sips of Scotch, melting into the amber color as much as the liquor.   
  
"Then I won't," Eames replied and Arthur turned his head to stare at him like he's just announced he was suddenly and distressingly straight. "No, no, not like that pet." He rubbed his gloved thumbs over the rim of his tumbler. "I want to, I cannot even communicate how much I want to, but..."   
  
"If you make a crack about my Victorian sensibilities, I will toss you over the roof." Arthur promised.   
  
"If your work clothing is supposed to put me off, darling, it’s doing a piss poor job of it. No, I just..." He shrugged, "Want to do this right."   
  
"So...what? We date for a few years, wait until Congress allows gay unions, and then have a big not-church white wedding?""

  


17

"You'd look so lovely in a tuxedo. And you could have a hat and a cane if you wanted. I wouldn't complain. But I'm afraid my dress would be awful tattered if it had any sort of bearing on reality." He scooped up Arthur's hand, put his tumbler down, and started playing with the long lines of Arthur's fingers. It felt deliciously, subversively, chaste that they both had gloves on. "But no, that isn't what I meant either. I believe you mad Protestant Americans have a lovely trope about the three date standard."  
  
"Well, I was going to go on more dates with you based on how you did in bed, but now I'm not so sure if you deserve a second date." Arthur didn't remove his hand, but didn't properly do anything with it either.   
  
"What? I haven't earned another one yet? You are cruel, darling. Perfectly and utterly cruel. Here I am, being a gentleman, saying that before I take you to bed and give you-if not the best night of your life-then a contender for the honor, I want to take you out about town. I want to show you how well I cook, how well I dance, how well I...I don't know. Ice skate. Roller derby. Horseback ride. What I want is for there to not be a single shadow of a lingering doubt in your mind about my intentions."   
  
Arthur considered this a moment, "You're sweet."   
  
Eames' face fell, "Oh, but you don't like sweet. Shall I be a bastard to you then? Fuck you for two minutes, fall asleep immediately, demand you make me breakfast and then and never call?"   
  
"I don't like rotten _either_ ." Arthur extracted his hand.   
  
"Spicy? We could do spicy. We could tango next to the river and I could work you into a fit, before vanishing off into the night. Or I could be an old salt and you have to teach me the meaning of love. Flaky? I could be flaky. In three seconds I am totally going to blow you-oh look a pigeon!"   
  
Arthur kept his composure remarkably well, but Eames could tell he was laughing on the inside. He and Arthur had a profound bond that let them know such things.   
  
"I'd offer to be hot, but I already am," Eames grinned and Arthur's eyes said everything there was to say on that matter. Mostly involving Eames knitted cap.   
  
He reached into his pocket and pulled out the decorative plastic bag of dog treats. "I'm not afraid to woo you through your dog."   
  
"I don't see why you feel the need to woo me. We could just go back to my place-and it would be my place so I can take Cigar for a walk in the morning, and you need to be up ridiculously early anyways, so I hardly want to be abandoned in your apartment-and I bend you over my couch and fuck you right there in the living room."   
  
"And I said I'm going to woo you despite that." Eames said, "Not that that isn't a perfect lovely image, of course."   
  
"Really? I thought you'd want to top." Arthur studied him. "Most men who date me do."   
  
"Is it because your arse is a thing of supreme beauty? I suspect it is."   
  
"But you'd give that up?"   
  
"Darling, if you wanted me to sit clear across the room in a corset and garters while you snapped pictures of me, and then sent me home to get yours off, I'd be fine with it as long as you were happy." No, wait, that was an inside thought. That was supposed to be an inside thought. Why wasn't that an inside thought? Accursed booze. Betrayed again.   
  
Arthur just looked at him like he'd lost his nut somewhere in Guam and was never going to get it back. Which was ridiculous, as Eames had never been to Guam, so clearly his nut had been lost elsewhere. Lost and turned into butter and eaten on the top of someone else' toast, otherwise, he would have given his mental capacity to Arthur to do with as he wished. Alas and woe.   
  
Arthur looked away again without comment, but took the dog biscuits and tucked them into his heavy woolen coat.


	2. Chapter 2

18

"How much do you want for your shoes?" Arthur asked when Eames had finally gotten him home (because Eames was a  _ gentleman _ and was hardly going to get his young man go and get mugged on his way home. Also Eames wanted a goodnight kiss. He wanted that a lot.)   
  
Eames looked down at his shoes. Then Arthur's shoes. Nothing in the world made sense for a long few moments, and then Cigar was leaping down the stairs (or rather, leaping down one stair, looking around and toddling to the the edge before hyping himself up for another jump, and repeating.) and gripped onto his shoe with the power of the extremely lovelorn. Eames could almost hear the music in the background. He could almost  _ hear _ it.   
  
"He pined. All night." Arthur kept his hands tucked in his pockets. "None of his normal shoes were good enough."   
  
Eames slipped off his shoes and Cigar climbed right inside of the left one, scooted his butt in and huffed excitedly, tail moving faster than a Weeping Angel. "Tell you what. You give me a date for each one of my shoes and we'll call it even."   
  
"He only really likes the left one." Arthur argued and Eames scooped the shoes up with Cigar still happier than any dog had any right to be.   
  
"But lefty and righty are part of a  _ set _ , Arthur. You cannot break up a set. That's just tragic. They basically share a soul. I know there is a pun we could both make and I offer a hesitant cease fire on it for the time being."   
  
"One more date," Arthur bargained and Eames was just a sucker for small dogs in love with his shoes and their hard-arsed owners. He handed the pair to Arthur and Cigar was gleefully tugging on one of the laces like he and the lace would never be apart again.   
  
"It's...cold out. You should stay." Arthur said looking at his stocking feet and Eames considered this a moment, then moved up the step, fit his hand around the back of Arthur's neck and reached up to kiss him, right there in the stairwell. The steps were cold under his toes, and he could only feel Arthur's skin right there on his lips. It was sort of gloriously Victorian filth and Arthur breathed out soft and beautiful through his nose, tilting his head and moving, just subtly and Eames let it go on, just basked in the slow, shivering moments of it, before quietly, gently, disengaging. He didn't want to. He didn't want to like how he didn't want to get out of bed and go to work in a cold morning. He wanted to curl up inside Arthur and live in his bloodstream and die a happy heroic death fighting off a virus or something. He would beat up bacteria so hard all the time if he could to stay curled up in Arthur's veins.   
  
"You'll catch your death." Arthur chastised and Eames wished he'd taken his glove off so he could feel the complexities of Arthur's hair and the heat of his skin. But for a moment having him close was very nearly almost enough.   
  
"Promise to come to my funeral."   
  
"I don't go to the funerals of people who cockblock me." Arthur leaned ever so slightly into Eames' hand. "So you'd best not die."   
  
"Understood." Eames nodded, then padded down the stairwell in his bare feet and made the very cold, treacherous walk home.

  
  


19

The problem with Eames’ life, at the moment, beside the fact that the apartment above him played music far too loudly, and that sometimes his food deliveries were late, and that Ariadne  _ insisted _ he do marketing surveys  _ every time they called _ , no matter what it was about or how long they were (they had helped with some problems he'd been having, yes, and sure, he wanted to help some poor sod trapped behind a phone and a computer screen, but they were so  _ boring _ .), and that he now no longer had his beloved pair of powder blue lucky shoes, was that Arthur had one day off a week.   
  
One.   
  
Eames technically had no days off, but after he did all of his prep work he could sort of leave whenever he wanted. He actually didn't need to stay even a quarter as long as he tended to, but he  _ liked _ being in his bakery. It smelled more like home than his flat ever could. He'd put more effort into his bakery then he ever had in his apartment, and there were far more interesting people in his bakery than in his apartment. Currently.   
  
However, with Arthur only having the one day off, that meant that no dates could happen between Friday and the next Thursday. He could go in and see Arthur at his work, of course, but that seemed vaguely desperate, and while he was smitten as a written mitten'd kitten in a bitten Britain he was never one to come across as pointedly desperate. So he went to work and thought of Arthur, and then went home and thought that measure more of Arthur and then sent a text to Arthur saying  _ If U were a peace of china, U would B a teacup. _   
  
And then he'd spend the next hour thinking of Arthur before getting a text back saying  _ Did you just call me fragile? _ _   
_ _   
_ _ U hld all that is vital 2 civ. _ He'd reply.   
  
_ Tea? _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Ys _ _   
_ _   
_ And then his phone would ring and he'd talk to Arthur, and Arthur would poke at him saying that he couldn't even wait the requisite three days before calling, and Eames would say that he'd thought he'd rather shown his hand about playing cool, and Arthur would say that Cigar liked his treats and Eames would smirk to himself.   
  
And, overall, it would be a good night, maybe with a long, rambling conversation that would eventually go to Hogwarts houses, and how Eames wanted to be a Hufflepuff because they were eclectic and he felt bad for them. Arthur would think the four-system inane, because people should not be sorted in: Smart, Brave, Ambitious (Evil), and Helpful. "What about the cowardly, stupid, lazy people? Hmm?" He'd say.   
  
  
"You go to the American wizardly schools then," Eames would say and Arthur would go out on a diatribe, and it would be lovely.   
  
But they couldn't go on a  _ date _ until Thursday, and Eames really rather needed to think of something. Dinner, he thought. Dinner would be best. Date one was a drink and dancing, date two could be dinner and a movie, and date three...he'd think about date three later. And date four. And five. And however many dates he got in the future. Hopefully enough that he got some truely epic ones in.   
  
But what movie?   
  
But that problem was thankfully solved when Arthur hinted his extensive knowledge of vintage Warner Brother's cartoons, most specifically Bugs Bunny cartoons, and well... that gave him a plan.

  
  


20

"Why are all of our dates outside?" Arthur asked, blowing into his gloved hands and Cigar poking his head out of his wool lined dog bag. Arthur had a bag for Cigar that matched his shoes. He coordinated his  _ shoes _ with his  _ carrier case for his dog _ . And his belt, of course. And sort of Cigar, since they were all the same rich leather brown.   
  
Eames didn't ask why the dog was present, and Arthur didn't offer an explanation. Eames had borrowed a friend's pick up truck, taken the thing through the most expensive and elaborate car wash on the planet, and gotten loads of squishy blankets to load into the back. He had a bag of popcorn and a thermos of coffee and he and Arthur were leaning against the cab as Cigar sniffed the cold air with distinct  _ what is this? What is this? Is this bad? Why is this? What? What? LOOK FOOD _ when Eames continued to buy his affection with handmade dog treats.   
  
"You'll make him fat," Arthur said, having hesitantly given in to Eames tugs to sit between his legs. He was stiff for a bit, but eventually relaxed into the warmer space of them and blanket. "He'll be a fat wiener dog and we'll have to roll him around, and he won't be able to fit into his shoe."   
  
"My shoe."   
  
Arthur tugged Cigar out of his bag to display that Cigar was still determinedly hanging on to being inside Eames' shoe. Eames placed the shoe down on the squishy blankets and made sure Cigar was tucked into his own little castle of blankets until he was just a head poking out and sniffing.   
  
"What are we watching, anyways?" Arthur asked, as Eames took his hands, shed the gloves from them, and wrapped his hands around Arthur's. Arthur's fingers were frigid and  _ that _ wouldn't do at all.   
  
"Here, turn towards me a bit."   
  
Arthur sighed and did and then sort of jerked when Eames slid his hands under his shirt. He manfully resisted hissing at the chill.   
  
"You have a hypothermia fetish, don't you? We'll finally have sex and I'm going to need to do it in a bathtub full of ice."   
  
Eames laughed and decided to just let Arthur have the last word, and Arthur inched his fingers to warmer skin. He could have removed them, but after a few moments, they were warm and pressed against his back and Arthur's body was close, and neither of them moved.   
  
"So what are we watching?"   
  
Eames nodded to the large drive-in-theater screen, and flicked on the speaker. Soon the screen lit up in technicolor and the speaker blared with the familiar Looney Tunes >boooooig _ Opera _ began playing.   
  
Eames was careful to keep his study of Arthur's face as secret as he could. Arthur's attention was fixated on the animation, but it did nothing so so simple as let his face relax into childish delight, or to laugh, or even smile properly. He was just, simply, riveted as Big plotted and planned, and came into the Opera dressed as Leapold. As he ordered the earmuffs and left his glove hanging in the air. It was as if there was some other movie playing, something breathtaking and intricate and fascinating, but when Eames looked up, it was still just Bugs Bunny playing the banjo and waggling his eyebrows.   
  
Eames didn't say anything. He just rested his chin, carefully on top of Arthur's head as Arthur watched like it was vital to his continuing existence to keep watching. His lips moved subtly when Bugs said "I knew I shoulda taken that left turn at Albuquerque."   
  
Eames reached down to scratch around the line of Cigars blanket peeking over the blanket and Cigar panted into the pad of his fingers, then went back to gnawing off mouthfuls of his treat.

  
  


21

Arthur's attention didn't waver from the full two hours of shorts that Eames had tracked down and gotten Ariadne to computerize. It was a renovated drive-in theater, using a computer projector as opposed to needing film canisters, which was lucky for Eames, or he would have needed to pay Ariadne  _ so much overtime _ as he tracked down Bugs Bunny original reels. He watched, barely blinking, never laughing, and Eames didn't know quite what that meant, but Arthur didn't tell him to stop, so he just focused on curving his body to be the most comfortable for Arthur, and even when he slipped his own hands into the folds of Arthur's coat, Arthur didn't take his eyes away or speak.   
  
When they rolled to a close Arthur still didn't say anything and just closed his eyes and pushed his face into Eames' stomach and Eames just slowly began stroking his back. "Pet, what? I thought...I mean you."   
  
  
In the conversation spawning this idea (which Eames still didn't know if it was good or bad idea or what even-) Arthur had simply said their used to be a theater downtown that played Warner Brother cartoons every Thursday. And Eames had rather thought that meant the a wee!Arthur had  _ gone _ to said cinema enough to know and remember that information, not that...he didn't even know what.   
  
Cigar, struggled out of his cave of blanket and shoe and slowly toddled unsteadily to stick his face under Arthur's shirt and pant at his navel in what might have been an attempt to help.   
  
"Darling?"   
  
Arthur took a breath and picked up Cigar. "We're going back to my apartment now."   
  
"Of course." Eames agreed, not even bothering to figure out the blankets, just scooting them down to grab Cigar's shoe. Arthur cradled Cigar as he got out and straightening in slow, determined degrees as Eames pushed the hatch back up and walked to his side of the car and opened the door. Arthur didn't say anything, just climbed in and sat down, buckled himself in and Eames put his shoe into Cigar's carrier case, placed that by Arthur's feet, and then drove.   
  
Arthur rubbed onto of Cigar's tiny, silky ears between his thumb and forefinger and Eames parked, swung out and Arthur was already getting out. It was a bit of a walk back to Arthur's flat, since it was a city, and city parking, and only in movies could people park right outside of the building they wanted to get into.   
  
"Come inside." Arthur didn't so much ask as order, so Eames went up the stairs behind him and Arthur opened the door, took Eames shoe from Eames and plopped Cigar in it, before putting Cigar on the ground. Cigar panted up at them for long moments before deciding they were simply too big to comprehend, and scooted across the floor to his food bowl, climbed in and fell promptly asleep.   
  
Eames didn't think Arthur was upset, not exactly, but something was afoot. Arthur dragged Eames by the wrist to his entertainment center, opened the cabinet door and there were...   
  
"Do you own things  _ besides cartoons _ ?"   
  
"No," Arthur said.   
  
Eames looked at him and Arthur looked at the wall.   
  
"I just...I've always felt they were lying to me." Arthur cleared his throat. "I like cartoons. They're...straightforward. When you said we were going to a movie I was sort of..." Arthur thinned his lips. "You are a terrifyingly good listener."   
  
"You say that like it's a surprise."   
  
"I thought I'd be drowned out with how load your clothing is." Arthur quickly parried and Eames laughed and felt like grabbing Arthur and swinging him around and around the flat until Cigar woke up and toddled around behind them.   
  
"So, you're always like that with cartoons?"   
  
Arthur shrugged with one shoulder. "A little yeah. But it was mostly just." He jaw clicked shut and he turned to the kitchen. "Can I get you something to drink."   
  
"Darling, darling, darling." Eames sidled up behind him and just lightly rested his hands on Arthur's waist. "I like ridiculous colorful clothing and you like cartoons. I can like cartoons too."   
  
"I can't like your clothing."

  
  


22

"Then you'll just be more inclined to rip if off me, won't you?" He murmured below Arthur's ear and, in a fit of roguish daring, pressed his lips to that soft, warm little spot at the give of Arthur's jaw.   
  
Arthur shuddered and did a quick, neat, little turn, before grabbing Eames' shirt and basically slamming him down onto the couch, climbing on in a slow, roll and announcing, "We are going to make-out on the couch until you either let me fuck you, or you run out of saliva and have to walk home hard."   
  
"You are devious, darling."   
  
Arthur's lip quirked before he bent down and pressed a few, delicate, quick little kisses up his cheek and Eames slowly ran his hands up Arthur's firm, strong thighs currently pinning him quite effectively and then down Arthur's sides. He could get addicted to the way Arthur breathed, if he took the inkling. There was nothing inherently special about it. His breath smelled like anyone's, he breathed slowly, regularly, his sides were muscled and sturdy beneath Eames palms. But Eames just...he just liked knowing Arthur was alive. He wanted to go to sleep with his hand on Arthur's back and to go to sleep knowing he was alive, and fall into dreaming secure in that. He wouldn't be able to explain it. He didn't go into pastries because he was some sort of language savant.   
  
Arthur put a hand on Eames forehead and pushed his head back and began kissing up his throat. Well, kissing was a word for it, but his lips weren't soft as they moved. It was rather more a prelude to biting, but unsure of how welcome his teeth were.   
  
"Rather pushy there, aren't you?"   
  
"You can stop me whenever you want." Arthur said, head rising like a striking snake and he stared steadily at Eames. Eames shrugged into the couch and Arthur head clenched against his head and then, slowly, obviously he lowered his head, nuzzled into the collar of Eames' shirt. He kissed the tense muscle of his shoulder, like the brief coolness of Iodine before an IV sank in, and Eames swallowed hard.   
  
"May I?" Arthur asked, to the cooling skin and Eames didn't suddenly realize anything. He didn't know where he was anymore than he'd known what was going on with Arthur and his cartoons, but, likewise, he knew that regardless of where he was, he very much wanted to stay there. Eames knew that he maybe was given to making poor choices on an impulse. He accepted this about himself.   
  
"Whatever you like." Eames agreed and Arthur's hand pushed his head to the side with a slow, determined movement. "Though I will say that if you're a vampire, I will be incredibly disappointed if you kill me."   
  
"I don't like the Gothic movement." Arthur sniffed, "Too clunky and obvious."   
  
"Oh, of course darling, of course. I shall research into subtle monsters, then. Something delightfully dangerous, but only if you are painfully dumb, hm?"   
  
Arthur bent down and pressed his teeth against Eames' skin. It lacked a certain element of passion, as it was all a deliberate, careful, excruciating application of pressure, but Eames could still feel the rise of pain like a second heartbeat and he went from frowning to hissing into it, as Arthur bite incrementally harder until Eames thought he could feel it down in his bones. His legs were hard on Eames' sides and his fingers sharp in his hair and Eames was the one who was petting Arthur through it. He wasn't sure why, but his hands were gentle on Eames' back and Arthur let go, sudden and the pain for that was just as fierce but Arthur was suddenly all ferocity, all vicious need and Eames rolled them sharp to the side and Arthur rolled them easily against the floor as Eames pillowed Arthur's head in his forearms and he licked into Arthur's mouth, neck throbbing.

  
  


23

Arthur relaxes under him, slow, easy and Eames slows down with it, kissing and stroking Arthur's hair and Arthur sighs, hand coming up to rub against the sore, spit-lick spot on his neck and Eames arched his head to the side and Arthur pauses, pulls away for a moment, but not far. His lips still brush agaisnt Eames' and Eames stares down at him, likely him close and warm under him.   
  
"You really will just go along with anything," Arthur cocked his head and pressed another soft kiss and Eames scratched his fingers against the very top of Arthur's head.   
  
"I'm an easy going sort of fellow," Eames turned his head and Arthur darted a kiss to his jaw. "You aren't going to scare me away."   
  
"If I wanted to scare you away, I wouldn't have shown you my extremely tiny little dog."   
  
Eames nodded, "That was a poor tactical move on your part. I would suggest next time something that does not flop it it's dinner bowl and snuff excitedly for the food faerie."   
  
They turned to peer around the couch where Cigar was, indeed, staring up mournfully towards the ceiling, his tag wagging intermittently.   
  
Arthur groaned and gave Eames mouth another not-so-quick kiss, "I have to feed him."   
  
Eames rolled off and stretched out on the floor as Arthur got up and reached into the fridge to pull out a package of homemade dog food and heated it up briefly in the microwave, before scooping Cigar out with one hand and plopping him back down into his shoe. Cigar wagged his tail like it wanted to fly off and attack brigands and Eames rolled onto his side to watch. Arthur peered down at his dog.   
  
"If it puts your mind at ease, I used to be a thief."   
  
"Why on earth would that put my mind at ease?"   
  
"Well, now you know i'm not the blushing, bruising petal of innocence, here, so you don't need to worry about me scampering off the moment my virtue is in question."   
  
" _ You _ are the one who won't put out until date three," Arthur replied automatically, and when Eames just smiled up at him he scratched the back of his neck in a preciously nervous gesture. "A thief?"   
  
"Mmm." Eames, blinked, slow and easy. "Pickpocket, actually. Like the Artful Dodger, only seventeen and flopping through Italy flat broke and not knowing a smidgen of Italian." Eames shrugged, then fell onto his back. "I was rather unfortunately dumb in my formative years."   
  
"Explains a lot," Arthur didn't sound even slightly perturbed about Eames confession and didn't offer one of his own. Which was fine, Eames hadn't told him to get him to admit all the shadows in his composition. Just had felt like sharing a tidbit.   
  
"Doesn't it just?" Eames replied, capitulating easily when it suited him. He got up and moved to turn Arthur towards him and start kissing again, and Arthur went, twinging his tongue around Eames and the longest kiss on record was 30 hours, which had always made Eames sort of ache in confusion, but now...yeah...he wouldn't mind that. He wouldn't mind that at all.

  
  


24

"I just want to say Ariadne-"   
  
"No more talking."   
  
"It's just that-"   
  
"No. More. Talking. Your talking privileges are revoked. If something is on fire, you can put it out with your body, because there is  _ no more talking _ from you. Boss." Ariadne was vicious with her metal spatula. Diligent to her cake's well being, of course, as she carefully layered the coconut filling over the moist, delectable layers of [ German chocolate cake](http://www.kitchenproject.com/history/GermanChocolateCake/OriginalRecipe.htm) , but Eames was maybe a wee bit afraid for his own limbs.   
  
He'd let Ariadne pick the music for the entire rest of the week, and he solemnly swore to pay her five extra dollars on the hour for all the extra time she was pulling-which, he was the first to admit-was a lot, but apparently even though he was the nicest boss in the world she was still going to cruelly mistreat him, simply because he maybe had forgot entirely about a vegan cake for Friday, and she had only barely remembered at midnight, and then had to stay and make the damn thing, and he was maybe more than a bit in trouble.   
  
"I understand that you're...like...high on love right now, and I’m happy to say that we both know that if I get a significant other in the near future, I will date him and you will pick up the slack  _ without comment _ , and I am very glad that you picked yourself up frilly lacy panties and asked him out, I am, I really am, but  _ come on. _ .."   
  
"Yes ma'am." He made puppy eyes at her back, and then, when that didn't work, he pulled out his cellphone, walked over and used his secret weapon.   
  
"Oh dear lord that is the cutest of all dogs." Ariadne melted, which was not a remark on her character, but simply a note that no one could be upset when there was a video of Cigar scooting around after a ball in his shoe. "We need to post that on YouTube and be the most famous people ever."   
  
"And sometimes Arthur puts him in his pocket as he walks around and does things so Cigar can feel big." Eames waggled his phone, "I may have a video if you stop being angry at me."   
  
"You play dirty. And are an emotional blackmailer." Ariadne went back to her cake, but she kept glancing at the cell phone, before huffing. "Fine, but I still own the radio and get my overtime pay."   
  
"Of course darling, of course. Now look at how happy he is. He gets to see things."   
  
Ariadne watched with a hand to her mouth, and then regained her composure and changed her gloves. "Fine, you can talk, but only because you have an in to wee dog videos and I want more of them. If you fail to get me more of them I will take a sick day on Thursday and you will have  _ no way to prove _ I'm not sick."   
  
"You have gotten mean in your not-jailbait age."   
  
"Would you listen to that cake? The baker thinks he's funny. Do you think he's funny cake?"   
  
Eames' life is so hard.   
  
But he makes [ petit pots au chocolat](http://lateliervi.blogspot.com/2008/10/petit-pots-de-crme-au-chocolat.html) and moves the rich, satiny custard into chocolate crumb tart pans with a layer of bittersweet chocolate between the crust and the custard. He used to do it without the layer, but then the two chocolate tastes resembled each other too strongly. Chocolate was not a singular experience. One had to vary the sorts of chocolate, or people became bored. He mixed up some brandy whipped cream and set a small, cheeky dollop on top, before getting one of the trays down and setting them on the parchment paper. He liked the crinkle of the paper, the smell of the ovens whrilling, the fact that Ariadne was now muttering to herself about the structural integrity of pie crust.   
  
But he wished Arthur was there.   
  
"And how about this," Eames added after an hour or so of squeezing meringues. "Lunch is on me."   
  
"You just want to go to Arthur's bistro."   
  
"Yes, obviously, but I will buy lunch from there and  _ pay for it _ ."   
  
"I want the turkey club. Get me the turkey club, and if the soup is something with cheese, that too."   
  
Eames smiled to himself.

  
  


25

Arthur was in a sharp white waistcoat, with a muted (for the time) pair of trousers, and his usual jaunty hat, cuff and collars. His sleeves were a bit puffer than previous, and so he'd rolled on sleeve garters that Eames couldn't quite convince himself to stop staring at.   
  
"What's the soup of the day?" he covered, but he didn't think he'd been entirely smooth about it.   
  
Arthur nodded to the board to his left. Baked Potato soup. He ordered two cups, one with a heavy amount of cheddar and the other with as much bacon as they were legally allowed to serve. He was about to order a sandwich to go with his, when Arthur ignored him entirely and started preparing a salad, just went into the back and came back with two bowls.   
  
"Oh, are you looking out for my health?"   
  
"You don't need anymore starches or fats. The salad is delicious. Now go to work."   
  
Eames frowned, "When  _ I _ serve  _ you _ food, I always specially design my flirting just for you."   
  
"That's because you're the chef. The chef can do what he wants. The head of house cannot." Arthur blinked. "If you want I can get Chef Yusuf. He could flirt with you."   
  
"Can I meet him, is he busy?" Eames peered around to the swinging kitchen door.   
  
"He's always busy." Arthur put Eames purchases in a bag. "That doesn't mean he can't talk and make vegetable stock. Who knows, maybe you can arrange something so he doesn't have to make the bread anymore."   
  
Eames gestured for Arthur to lead the way. Arthur fixed his hat, pushed open the door and walked Eames to a stainless steel prep table near a stove-salamander-grill-roasting oven set up. Pots hung off hooks in the walls, and the area above the table had a chandelier of whisks, spatulas, spoons, measure spoons, sieves and China caps. Yusuf was chopping carrots like some people riddled out gossip.   
  
"Chef-"   
  
"If this is to ask for another day off so you can see your British stalker, you can't have it. I hate head of house and all the teenage girls get so dramatically upset when you aren't here."   
  
"Hello," Eames offered cheerfully. "I decided to stalk Arthur to work today. Meet the folks."   
  
Chef Yusuf looked up and then nodded for Arthur to get back up front. Arthur did so without comment, fixing his cravat and stepping out. Yusuf had a glass of white wine sitting below the plate warmer behind him. "We have a restaurant on the other side of the building. At two my Sous Chef will come in, and Line Cooks and Prep cooks had better be in at three." He tossed the rough-chop carrots into that thick bottom soup pot, before picked up another two and hacking through the thick roots with a determined plunk of his hand.   
  
"Ah," Eames offered. "Need any help?"   
  
"We have a 1,200 cover night planned." Yusuf said and Eames rolled up his sleeves, scrubbed his hands, wet a towel and put it under a chopping board, before taking one of the Global choppers off the magnetic strip, taking the turnips and taking off the root, before cleaving it in half, then into rough quarters, eighths, into the pot, next turnip. They were slight for a bit, Yusuf not stopping him until they had enough vegetables in the pot for a good, rich, thick vegetable stock. Yusuf grabbed some sherry without a thought, poured it in, then filled up a 12-cup with water and dumping it in.   
  
"No culinary school, then?" Eames asked and Yusuf plopped his pot down.   
  
"Cooking schools have no soul. They're just making robot little so-called chefs who only know one way to do anything. I had a man come in from some fancy school in New York, and I fired him. No soul, no...life. He did not want to experiment. I have a Prep Cook who takes three hours to clean the night's chicken, but she thinks. She does what's she told and she has imagination." Yusuf flicked the pilot on and then he way picked everything up and dropping it into the dish pit.   
  
Yusuf looked at him with a sort of smile. "You neither?"   
  
"Couldn't afford it. Degree makes things easier, but..." Eames stepped back as Yusuf dropped a silver platter in front of him.

  
  


26

"Freshly caught trout. I need a platter. Use what you can find in the walk-in." Yusuf turned and went to do some more prep work. Prep never really swung into gear until three, because much longer than that and things would go stale, or cold. You got your vegetables and starches ready, yes, but the meats and the breads and the sides...that needed to be done carefully.   
  
Eames got out parsley, a cucumber, some carrot tops some Frisée, some roma tomatoes, a lemon, an orange, an apple and escarole lettuce. He searched around for a zester, a paring knife and some toothpicks.   
  
He zested the cucumber, more for the long green curls of peel then for the cucumber itself, though back when he'd worked salad bar in his apprenticeship he always zested and dug out the bitter, goopy seeds of the cucumber, just to keep it firm and give the vegetable some texture. He carefully applied the same treatment to the lemon and orange, the sweet, sharp spice of citrus different the the cool, wet, freshness of vegetation. From there it was just a matter of coiled the long colorful strands around toothpicks.   
  
Most of a presentation of fish should, of course,  _ be the fish _ . However, one did not simply want to plop a breaded and grilled trout-eyes and head still intact- and then expertly bone him for the viewing pleasure of the table on just any old plate. There was panache and showmanship involved, there should be the curly body that came with a body of escarole, the fresh, frilly curls of Frisée, with the red and dark edges coiled, bountiful along the edge of the platter. He flayed the tomatoes and coiled the skin into delicate little rosettes and placed them into the carved out tops of jagged carrots.   
  
There should be a counterbalance to the fish, something that draws the eyes first and them segues into the meat. Not as large as the fish, no, but a heavy, noticeable presence. Eames liked [ apple swans](http://video.about.com/culinaryarts/How-to-Make-an-Apple-Swan.htm) . He just needed to brush the whites of the flesh with lemon juice and place it in a frilly bed of Frisée, dot the rest of the platter with his zest pinwheels and rosettes, and he nodded to himself.   
  
Yusuf walked over and looked at it a moment. "Simple."   
  
"It's about the food." Eames shrugged, "Don't overburden your cake with decoration. Seems to apply to fish as well."   
  
They looked at each other a moment, before Yusuf smiled, nothing like a grin, but neither was it as secretive as Arthur's and held out his hand. Eames squeezed it firmly and Yusuf nodded.   
  
"We will meet for lunch, talk about you freeing me of the infernal task of baking every day, hmm?"   
  
"Only too pleased." Eames plucked up his bag and Yusuf stopped him.   
  
"He can take care of himself, so I won't threaten you, but understand he's not had a good time of it. And I have knives." Yusuf cleared his throat. "Go make a cake now. I'm busy."   
  
Eames did a bow-out, then gave Arthur a peck on the cheek.   
  
"Eat your salad!" Arthur demanded as Eames walked out, just barely restraining himself from whistling.

  
  


27

Eames liked soup. He liked a lot of things, crunchy leaves, colors, Arthur, Arthur's arse, Arthur's serious face, Arthur's love of cartoons, Arthur's feet, the way Arthur dimpled when he was just having a moment with his dog, submarines, gambling, baking, the word ocelot, hard cider, warm beer, sleeping in, staying up late, good food, long parties, the fact that Arthur was now worried about his eating habits...he liked a lot of things, but there was something special about soup. Something that sunk in and grew. He liked coming in from the cold, getting out a pair of soup spoons, plopping Ariadne's cup on the counter and leaning against the till and prying open the lid.   
  
"Was there  _ just _ soup, or...?" Ariadne rifled around in the bag and pulled out of the salads. "Why is there is salad? Did you previously know salad existed? Or...vegetables?"   
  
"Arthur made it, Eames said, mixing his soup, luxuriating in the smell of salt-sweet-bacon, sharp-smooth cheese, the tang of green onions, the snap of garlic and yellow onions, the underlying hint of chicken broth and the rich, earthy, salty taste of potatoes bringing them all together. He liked soup because it made separate things into a cohesive whole. He liked that about soup. Everything about cooking and baking was balancing flavors, about combining things like rosemary and chocolate and raspberry, but soup had everything melding together and even and careful textures and mouthfeel.   
  
Bad potato soup was mealy, or too thick, or too runny, or didn't use cream and butter and real bacon like things  _ should _ . But this? Oh, this was just the right texture, the potatoes whirled into the cream and bacon fat and chicken broth, but still had the texture of bacon bites and gooey cheese and sharp, crisp green onions and chives. He melted a bit into the till as he licked the clinging, creamy remains from the spoon and Ariadne answered in a similar moan. It was all the delectable richness of a properly loaded baked potato, but none of the bother with chewing or skins.   
  
"Fuck this is good soup," Ariadne said as she scrapped the last remains from the inside of her Styrofoam cup. "I like when people use actual fresh herbs. You can taste it." She wiped her mouth with the back of one hand and then opened the salad bowls before crunching in. Eames did not like salad. He should like salad, he could appreciate salad as a thing, but he did not like salad. All the flavors were too independent from one another, and even if you got the freshest ingredients things still went awry. And this salad, while no exception, certainly was trying. Or rather, Arthur had been trying. He had slices of grilled chicken, and succulent little strawberry halves, and tangy bites of mandarin orange with a sweet, flavorful drizzle of orange-poppyseed dressing.   
  
But that just meant he ate the chicken, strawberries and orange and glared bayfully at all the green nonsense left over.   
  
"Eat your vegetables," Ariadne said.   
  
"I don't  _ want _ them." Eames complained, but she grabbed his hand, stabbed his fork into the spinach, and he glared and chewed, but he wasn't  _ happy _ about it.   
  
"So, what's date number three going to be, Casanova?"   
  
"I take offense to the Italian slur you have just placed me under." Eames scowled and she shrugged.   
  
"I'd give you a great British lover's name, except  _ wait _ , there  _ isn't one _ ."   
  
"James Bond."   
  
"Ah, ah, he just  _ gets _ tail, he can't keep it around for very long at all." Ariadne crunched on her salad and Eames stabbed another unhappy, healthy bite and glowered at her.   
  
"Come on, third date's the big one. Horse and carriage ride? Moonlit, candle dinners? Ice skating?"

  
  


28

Eames shrugged, "Thought I'd make him and his dog dinner. Not the same dinner, mind you, but get them to my place, put a table cloth on the table, break out some candle and cook like I have never cooked before. We could go swing dancing before. It's Swing night at the caves on Thursday. I'm rubbish, mind you, but half the fun is being taught, mmm? And then we can have a romantic walk home, I'll feed him-grilled duck, I think, most of that is in the prep work. Or maybe a nice rare, marinated tuna. Oh! No, I should have the duck, and then show him how I do mashed potatoes, and then whip up some seared asparagus and carrots. The rubbish part is that I'd usually save the wow factor for dessert, but he is rather determined to ruin my life entirely. I'll just have to make fantastically good rolls."   
  
"Just don't sing to him." Ariadne turned and hid her salad under the counter as the very trickling beginnings of their after-lunch-treat rush tottled in and Ariadne turned charming insistence into an artform. A strange, unheard of artform only discovered in the dark corners of disgruntled liberal art colleges, and one could debate whether it was art or not, but it was a thing, that thinged and it did it so well. Eames could also be charming, but this is what he was paying Ariadne the significantly above minimal wage for and went back to his kitchen to get the bread order ready. He liked doing sourdough, especially, as he'd had this same soughdough starter for upwards ten years. He'd named it Lydia and they celebrated her birthday (April 4th) in style.   
  
It was just true that once Eames got attached to something, he bloody well  _ stayed _ attached. Ariadne just sort of patted him on the head about it, but he was the  _ boss _ so she could put that in her bunt pan and cook it, cool it, and stick a flower pot in the middle. Nyeh.

  
  


29

Now, the rest of Eames' delightful love life could have continued on. He could have perused Arthur's suit until Arthur finally gave in and admitted he was as utterly mad about Eames as Eames was about him and then they would eventually get married with Cigar being their ring dog by dragging the rings down the aisle in his shoe, and adopted three Malaysian children and place unethical bets about which dad each child would emulate in dress, and they would have fights over jam, and then make out by snuggling in bed afterwards, and Eames would give the children too many cookies, and Arthur would grill in the backyard on weekends, as Cigar the fat dog toddled around bemoaning his inability to fit in his shoe.   
  
That was how it  _ would _ have gone had there not been previous foreshadowed angst in Arthur's background. Now, had this been a different story, Eames thought, one different than the one he's living, then he would have either: a.) married Arthur, b.) discovered Arthur was a vampire c.) discovered Arthur was a  _ actually _ a robot d.) discovered Arthur was a hitman who was supposed to kill Eames but hadn't because he's fallen in love. e.) A projection of Eames subconscious d.) something evil from the Internet.   
  
Really though, it was something far more tangential and Eames probably wouldn't have found out about if he hadn't flopped at home on his couch after a long day and was too lazy to change the TV off the news. Eames didn't like the news, it was either depressing and over-played, or inane and over-played. It was like the news could never decide between WAR and KITTENS! It was a KITTENS day, but unfortunately the local news hadn't been able to find a meme all by themselves, and thus were actually reporting on local flavor. First there was a report on some sort of spelling bee, which was kind of cute, and Eames decided that his future Malaysian children would win all of the spelling bees, even though he could vowel is way out of definately. Defiantly? Deafieniently? Difinitly? Definably? Defeateninglypantsyourmum.   
  
But the next one was the requisite downer feature story about how some local flavor had gone and married a French woman, done a whole load of ballroom stuff, then said beautiful French wife had gone and done something horrifically tragic and was now in some hospital somewhere being "cared for" (way to be helpful, there, news) and now local flavor was giving money or something to schools so they could increase their dance programs.   
  
Which would have been sweet but forgettable, had the local favor not been Arthur's pie orgy friend, and the video of said pie orgy friend (he'd had a name, hadn't he? Something. He'd had some sort of actual name.) was him ballroom dancing with his beautiful wife back in 04, with Arthur very clearly standing behind the camera as evidenced by the mirrors of the dance studio. Another clip a few minutes later had Arthur talking to them as the news anchor talked over the blurry home camera clip.   
  
Eames flopped over to his laptop and immediately swarmed over to Google, which was much more helpful.   
  
Dominic and Mallorie Cobb were Gold level ballroom dancers on the International circuit. They were, of course, technically perfect, with the right amount of flair to be stars, but Mallorie was enchanting. The real secret to ballroom was not in the dancing beautifully-everyone in a competition danced beautifully, but it was  _ capturing the judge's attention _ . If one could not entrance the judge's, one would simply not succeed. Most of that work was done in flamboyant costuming, and particular shades of hair color (only the darkest black, the reddest ginger, or the lightest blonde were ever really noticeable.), but Mallorie was...haunting. Eames couldn't have explained why, and, he supposed, that was rather the point.   
  
Arthur was their couch, their support, their ballroom dancing point man. He took care of the details and they put on a show, and while Mallorie Cobb was devastating good at attracting attention, Eames was conditioned to stare at Arthur, to pick Arthur out of a crowd, and Arthur was always there, quietly behind the scenes and turning away interviews.

  
  


30

That itself, probably, wouldn't have mattered. So, yeah, okay Arthur had done something before he'd opened up a Steampunk bistro and started coming to Eames' bakery. Sure, those sorts of things happened, everyone had a backstory. Eames had a backstory. Ariadne had a backstory. Everyone had a backstory, it was just true.  
  
It was just that _Arthur hadn't mentioned it_. Like, not even in that irritating "I've got issues" first date drop. _Nothing_. He'd brought Dominic Cobb to Eames' bakery, and for some reason Arthur got pie at the last Friday of each month and gave it to Dominic to do something with.  
  
So what was Eames to do with this information? Would Arthur have told him? Well, of course he would have. Maybe. Hopefully before they adopted their children and put the down payment on their tasteful two level house with the large garden, and roomy garage. Maybe. Hopefully. Might happen. But he couldn't just bring that up. Except it'd been on the news. The news was a thing. Eames could casually mention he'd seen Arthur on the news. Except how did one casually mention "So I heard you and your best mate and your best mate's wife used to be close, and then the two of them got in some sort of car accident and everything got fucked up. So's how that going?"  
  
Should he just wait for Arthur to mention it? Was it cruel to keep taking him dancing? Or was it the whimsical innocence of Eames request, made in ignorance of Arthur's life, made Eames stepping all over Arthur's trauma somehow charming. That seemed unlikely as Arthur probably didn't find anything of Eames charming. Except for all of him.  
  
Eames paused a moment as his good British boy modesty had a fight with his vicious British chav ego and then shook his head. You couldn't just _ignore_ that, but he couldn't bring it up, and he didn't want to have that rustling around before the third date, because then that would ruin everything.  
  
And so, like many men before him, and many men since, he chickened out and texted Arthur.  
  
 _saw the news_.  
  
He swallowed and then went to get some liquor, because it was the only way he was going to say sane.  
  
 _You watch the news?_ _  
_ _  
__whn im 2 lazy 2 chng the chnl._ He texted back.  
  
 _You would. Why do you hate vowels?_ Was Arthur's reply. Was he being sarcastic? Was he being coy? Little slimy bastard.  
  
 _What was on the news?_ Arthur asked after awhile. _I don't like the news._ _  
_ _  
_Bless Arthur and his properly punctuated sentences in text message form. Bless his little heart. He probably knew what people were going on about with split infinitives, and passive statements and had used a semi-colon at some point in his life. Bless his little socks.  
  
 _Kittens_ Eames, because he was not a brave man, typed. _Kittens were on the news_.  
  
 _Did they miss the point of Keyboard Cat again?_.  
  
 _IDK. Wots KC?_ _  
_ _  
_ _Filthy heathen._ _  
_ _  
_Arthur would tell him when he wanted to. Right?

  
  


31

He couldn't go on a date with Arthur, in good faith, knowing secrets about him he should know. Not that it was a secret once it was on the 12 o'clock local news. Or, well, maybe that was the best way to keep a secret. No one watched midnight news. But he  _ knew _ and he couldn't just know and let that be okay. But he equally couldn't just tell him he knew. And he couldn't have sex with him if he was this confused about everything.   
  
Maybe Arthur knew what he was talking about and didn't want to say. He should ask. But he didn't know how to ask. But he didn't and, but he... He needed to make a pie. A stress pie. He needed to make so many stress pies.   
  
_ Why are you still awake? _ Arthur texted while he was running the butter through the cold flour.   
  
He dialed him and put his mobile on speaker. "The news made me nervous."   
  
"Worried the cats will get you?" Arthur asked, sounded hoarse and sleepy, and Eames couldn't help put want to be in the same house as him, seeing Arthur nuzzingly into a burrito of blankets with Cigar flopped in his arms and slowly falling asleep. Eames wanted sixteen Arthurs flopping about.   
  
"I really just need a big strong man about the house, darling. Whatever am I to do by myself?"   
  
"You should get a dog," Arthur yawned, "save you from cats."   
  
"Does Cigar often defend you from the wee little pussies?" Eames chuckled, then had the idea of Cigar playing with a kitten and felt his heart melt. "Does he try and love them to death?"   
  
"He bopped one on the nose once." Arthur yawned. "Why are you  _ awake _ , you have to be up in four hours, don't you? And don't say kittens."   
  
Eames frowned as he moved on to make the sweet potato filling, mashing the starch together with a bit of egg and milk, cloves, allspice, brandy, cinnamon, and nutmeg. "Making a pie."   
  
Arthur was silent a moment, then, "You have no life."   
  
"When you aren't in my presence I spiral into a deep depression and just start acting like a robot and just go by route." Eames waited for his crust to cool off in the fridge. "It's tragic really. Any day now I'll start making Goth pies."   
  
Arthur hummed sleepily, "Go to bed Eames, because if you fall asleep before I get around to fucking you, you will regret it deeply."   
  
Eames laughed until Arthur hung up and then stared at his phone like it give him the answers to life's persistent questions.

  
  


32

Arthur had stories.   
  
Arthur had a lot of stories. He had happy stories, like the time he had found a Napoleonic (pre-war!) clock for two dollars at a yard sale, snatched it up and sold it for not a penny less then 10,340 dollars, but only after studying it and photographing it extensively. This had been when he was ten and he'd gotten the money in cash and hid it away until he was 17 and then used it to move away from home, at long last, and go to college. His plan otherwise had, at the time he was ten, to join the army as soon as possible, but his tendency to hide away in the library until it closed had paid off.   
  
He had sad stories, about how he'd gotten a cat when he was seven, gone to the pound with all of his birthday money and gotten the cat vaccinated and licensed and everything (it took a bit more than money and a gap-toothed smile, but small town America wasn't really all that worried with seven year old boys adopting cats). He'd promptly named the gray and white cat "Tailpipe" and moved it into his club house. Oh he got the cat food and water and stuff-proper, at the store-with the money he got from picking up golf balls at the backdoor neighbor's golf course (fifteen cents a ball) and made sure the club house was secure. He slept in there plenty of nights, squeezing through the gap of his window and then rolling it back closed as much as he could before sneaking off.   
  
And for two years he'd been happy, because Tailpipe was a perfectly sweet cat. He brought Arthur live baby mice (not really sure how to kill them, or even injure them, really) and hiding under the bed if a crow cawed. He snuggled up against Arthur as he read the summer months away, and every time he wandered off, he always came back in an hour or two to make sure everything was in order.   
  
But.   
  
There's only so much money a seven-to-nine-year-old can make, and when Tailpipe got an abscess on his tail, the medicine cost 300-far more then his paltry 75 dollars in savings would allow.   
  
He went to his parents for the money, begged them, and they had looked at the sickly Tailpipe with his pussing tail, and they just quietly took Tailpipe to the vet and put him down without so much as a word to Arthur. And that had been the end of that.   
  
Arthur still wasn't entirely over it.   
  
Arthur had a lot of stories. He had stories of triumph: the first time he'd taken a broken pocket watch home and repaired it. He had stories of failure. He had a lot of stories about failure.   
  
He had stories about Mal and Dom.   
  
Arthur had been dancing since he was small, his parents sternly frog-marching him to class (dance, gymnastics, acting, singing, piano) every day for ten years before they'd...given up. But that was neither here nor there and Arthur didn't believe in the American culture's cultivation of allowing your childhood to be your life (in whatever way one wanted to interpret that.)   
  
Mal had been dancing since she could walk-no ballet, ballet was a different form unto itself-but tap and jazz and then ballroom when she turned twelve and turned up her nose at group choreography. She'd won her first competition at five, and had been in two commercials, five kid's movies, and fifteen plays before she was eleven (but never by herself), and then turned from acting and musicals to partnering.   
  
Dom had started dancing his freshmen year at college because he'd had a crush on a girl in his architecture class.   
  
Bless him.   
  
"Hey," Dom said as Arthur opened his door, already prepared to go. "Got the...yeah."   
  
Arthur lifted the boxed pie, and quietly closed the door on Cigar. He whined and scratched, but he dutifully turned and went down the stairs behind Dom. Cigar wasn't the howling type. He just sat on the other side of the door until Arthur got home again.

  
  


33

Arthur, while a rather good dancer, never could quite draw the eye of a judge, he was too clean, crisp and technical to be a showman. He knew how to turn his feet, knew how to make all the lines, and when singularly in front of a judge they could never mark him down any points, but equally so, they never said he won. He just... He didn't have the presence. Arthur had never had any  _ presence _ . He did what he was supposed to as cleanly as possible, and then people just...forgot him.   
  
"You move, but you do not move  _ them _ ," Mal had said, petting his hair after he hadn't placed and she and her partner of the time-one in a long string of many-had gotten second. They would have danced together, perhaps, if they specialized in the same groups. "No, no, no, do not blame yourself. You must  _ find _ someone who makes your body sing."   
  
  
Arthur had huffed, "Romantic nonsense." and she had tugged one of his ears.   
  
"You will fall in love and it will be the happiest day of my life."   
  
He didn't remember, exactly how they stumbled across Cobb, just that they had, and one way or another they'd been in a dorm basement moving through a foxtrot and something had snapped into place as viscerally as a reset bone.   
  
Arthur climbed into the passenger side of Cobb's car and Cobb slowly plopped into the driver's seat. Arthur placed the box in his lap after drawing the seatbelt across himself, clicking it in and staring at the dashboard.   
  
They hadn't taken the world by storm. They hadn't been a sensation. They'd been quiet, competent, and well respected in the community, won the smaller competitions, got invited to steadily larger ones, traveled a bit and then got sponsorship.   
  
On the night Proclus Global offered their sponsorship of them as team, they bought five bottles of wine, stretched out and Mal ate an entire chocolate gateau by herself, Cobb hadn't stopped touching her all night, and both of them had tugged Arthur down between them as they planned what to do with real life actual  _ money _ .   
  
"Rocketship to the moon," Arthur had nodded solemnly, and Mal had put a finger to her chin and decided "All the shoes. I think I shall get all of the shoes." and Dom had proved to be  _ no fun at all _ and said he wanted a house and a backyard and  _ fifteen babies _ , and yes, if need be he could carry them if science so deemed it.   
  
"But dove!" Mal had tutted, "Your girlish figure!" And Arthur had pressed his face into Dom's stomach because at that moment he'd felt happy enough to shatter. Like he was too light to be structurally stable. Like there were too many bits inside him vibrating together, like a video he'd seen of the molecules in a gas, once, and he was just going to...to drunkenly something and never be the same again.   
  
He could have, at that moment, said that was the happiest moment of his life. Third, really, as the first had been when he first held Tailpipe, held him and realized that was something irrevocably  _ his _ , that Tailpipe would be there and would curl up in the curve of Arthur's stomach, and nudge his head between Arthur's face and his books, and play bed mice with his feet, and be  _ there _ . The second had, of course, been owning 10,000 dollars and knowing that no one was going to take anything from him ever again.   
  
But he could have said he was happy, and he could have said any number of things, but instead he had just stayed in the warm tangle of the three of them, Dom's stomach gurgling under his ear and Mal languorous and laughing at his back, and, better yet, they didn't make him sleep by himself on the couch, but all of them flopped, half-dressed, into bed, and maybe that could settle into some space in his happiest moments list. Somewhere without a number.   
  
Arthur had lots of stories. He just didn't tell them to people.

  
  


34

The ride is silent. The ride is always silent. Neither of them are much for small talk. Arthur stares down at the pie box-strawberry rhubarb- and Cobb just drives. It's not a long drive, but it sort of feels like it is. Or that maybe it should be. He's not sure, just that time moves differently in the car then it does otherwise.   
  
He doesn't need to come along. They don't need to do this to themselves, or at least, he doesn't need to do this to himself, but when Dom comes every last Friday of every month Arthur goes with him, with his pie and his suit, and he doesn't say anything.   
  
Arthur has only the one love story, afterall, and he has to see it through until the end.   
  
He couldn't call it a threesome because, well, for one they'd never all had sex together, it had never been a thing that could happen. They'd, in the pre-sponsorship days, lived in one tiny apartment together, got a large mattress on the floor and lived in each other's pockets as they did their day jobs and stood about in the kitchen cooking. Dom and Mal would dance in their furniture-free living room as Arthur stirred the soup and shouted out corrections, until Mal gathered him up and took him for whirl while Dom did the salad. He'd had a rubbish job, and both the Cobb's had had rubbish jobs, but they got along.   
  
But he also couldn't have called it a threesome, properly, because...well, he wouldn't have thought of this by his own, but Mal had one day, tucked up between Dom and Arthur on their mattress, watching one of her beloved little romantic Indie films on Arthur's laptop, "It is like this, ma mimi, we-" she gestured between Dom and and herself "-have managed to make one person. But even when two halves come together to make one whole, that whole needs something to couple with, yes? So we have you."   
  
"And I'm a whole person," Arthur asked as she tucked his head down onto her lap and Dom quietly lowered his arm from Mal's shoulders to around her waist so he could put a hand on Arthur's hip. She combed through his hair and he sighed, watching the flickering colors of the movies sideways.   
  
"You are, perhaps, close." She nuzzled into Dom.   
  
It was true, in a way, there was no room to squeeze in  _ between _ Mal and Dom. A gust of wind or a pinprick of light couldn't get  _ between _ them, but it was easy enough to come along, to be folded in alongside them, and when the time for contracts came, Arthur was the one who settled them, who negotiated and read and researched as Mal enchanted, and Dom sweet-talked. And it was the two of them who danced, but Arthur who did the logistics-took Mal to her dress fittings, and made sure Dom complemented her outfit with his own. Obviously the three of them came up with the routines. Obviously it was up to Mal and Dom to perform as Arthur watched and gripped onto his brochure and didn't understand how could look at anyone but  _ them _ .   
  
The two of them made the contacts, they did the charm and wit, but Arthur booked the dancing halls, and the planes, and made sure the two of them ate, and slept and stretched properly and warmed up properly, and he was the one who drove and the one who did the research on the judges (if they knew who they were before performing, which Arthur usually managed, somehow) and the background on the other dancers.   
  
But it wouldn't work without the three of them, and even if he didn't get laid once during the three years of their touring and competing and practicing, practicing, practicing, on the other hand... maybe it was weird, and he wasn't going to ask anyone's opinion about it, it wasn't anyone else's business, but they never asked him to leave, and he never left. It was just...one of those things, and he understood that most people...most people didn't...that it wasn't  _ like that _ for other people. That when you had three friends, and two of them were romantically involved, the third was the one shut out and expected to relocate. But it never occurred to him to get more than the one hotel room, and the one time he'd checked two beds instead of one (by accident) all three of them had just looked confused about what they could even use the second bed  _ for _ .

  
  


35

So they'd just pushed them together, and Arthur doesn't know what Dom feels about it, not now. He doesn't know what Dom thinks about anything these days. He's visiting Mal more than anything else, and Arthur used to visit with him, but...that doesn't...he couldn't... One of them had to make the money. One of them had to pay the bills, and Cobb was effectively rendered incapable of functioning on any level. So, it, of course, fell to Arthur.   
  
But back then? Back when they'd shoved the two beds together and collapsed into the middle like it was a sinkhole, Dom and Mal had molded themselves to each other, and then pulled Arthur as close to them as he could get. And then, when he'd showered, and they'd showered, and he'd climbed into his side of the bed, and they had wrapped around tight, it wasn't weird. That was the important thing. It was never  _ weird _ . It should have been, maybe, but being there while they were having sex just  _ wasn't _ strange. Not anymore than them taking him to Steampunk theme carnivals, or them watching movies together, or always getting three places at dinner. It was have been strange if he'd had to find somewhere else to be for a few hours. He did, sometimes, of course, but most of the time, it was just a thing he was there for in various capacities. Never fully included, you couldn't get a piece of paper between them, but as much as he could be. Not forgotten, in any case.   
  
That was just another story he wasn't telling anyone He tried not to think about it, much, just like he tried not to think of sunny days with Terry Goodkind and Tailpipe and a hammock.   
  
Dom looked over at Arthur as they rolled into the parking lot, "Arthur."   
  
Arthur unhooked his seatbelt and got out of the car, taking the keys from Dom, because Dom wasn't going to drive home by himself, Lord knew, Dom tucked his hands into his pockets and they walked towards the door, the wind more vicious in the flat plains of the lot instead of in the heat sink of the city.   
  
Arthur had, actually, turned the car so he'd get the brunt of the impact, hadn't even thought about it, just turned the wheel to the right and let the car the first red-light breaking car hit turn into him. He didn't know what had gone wrong then, too fast, too bright, too everything happening at once but...   
  
"Mal?" Dom knocked on the door. "We're back. We brought you a pie."   
  
Arthur stood quietly behind Dom, but Mal wouldn't notice him anyways. She never did. Her eyes slid right by Arthur like he was any one of the faceless nurses or Doctors. But she noticed Dom.   
  
Mal was quite reasonable in her injury. Dom and Mal's comas had only lasted twenty one hours. It was barely even a proper coma, honestly, but they hadn't been waking up, and Arthur had sat in their shared room and hadn't known quite what to do. So he'd sat and drank coffee and hadn't really thought of much of anything at all. But Dom had woken up and been fine, Mal had...she hadn't...   
  
They had a name for it, Reduplicative Paramnesia, but that wasn't quite right either. She didn't think that everything around her had been replaced. She thought none of it was  _ there _ , only Dom. Brain damage in just the right way so Mal didn't think anything around her was real. Not the room, not the sunshine, not food and certainly not Arthur. But she thought Dom was real and that they had to escape the fake world somehow.   
  
Arthur didn't know why he kept coming when she saw right passed him and smiled up at Dom. "Dominic," She sighed, cupping her hand to his cheek, and he kissed her wrist, "You faded away from me again."   
  
Arthur sat down across from Mal, took the pie from the box and the paper plates and...he plucked out the note on the bottom.   
  
_ When you're ready to tell me, I'll be ready to listen. _ _   
_ _ Love, _ _  
Eames_


	3. Chapter 3

36

"I mean, it might not be a big secret." Ariadne offered, as Eames stared down at the counter. "It was on the news. It isn't like you killed his brother, or anything. Or know someone who killed his brother. Or are his brother."   
  
"Well obviously I couldn't tell him that last one. He'd want to stop."   
  
Ariadne blinked at him and then crunched up her nose, "Gross."   
  
"If you aren't likely to have a baby and you weren't raised as siblings, I hardly see what the big deal is. Now if we were  _ raised _ as brothers, that would be different. I would have beat up the bullies at school and made him play the ogre in everything." Eames sighed, "Really, if we could have non-mutant-incest babies, our children would be intensely lovely. Which is why the only other person I know of in the world I'd want to have Arthur, besides me, is you. You would just be so tiny and brunette together."   
  
"One of these days the nice men in white coats will come back for you, and then I will be my own boss." She peered down at Eames ordering forms. "Dear lord, your handwriting is terrible. How do you even live?"   
  
"My wit and charm, darling. And my dashing good looks."   
  
She looked up, snorted and scowled down at the invoices. "Thank God you can bake. Anyways, it was on the news. It isn't like you stalked him or did a background check. It was on  _ the news _ . I get that he's a private sort of person, but if he doesn't want you to know about his life, it shouldn't be on the news."   
  
"You do background checks on all of your boyfriends don't you?"   
  
"And credit checks." Ariadne grinned, then shrugged, "I'm curious. But seriously. You're going to make this worse by obsessing over it."   
  
Eames turned back to his kitchen. Really he didn't need to be in as much as he was in. since he had Ariadne to run counter, but what would he do if he suddenly got ideas in his apartment? The kitchen there was rubbish.   
  
"How do you think he'll like a [ roast red pepper and sundried tomato tart](http://nookandpantry.blogspot.com/2007/02/roast-red-pepper-and-sundried-tomato.html) ?"   
  
"Get some spinach in there," Ariadne added absently, "We get a new shipment tomorrow and you haven't used it up yet."   
  
He nodded, scrubbing under his nails. "He does like spinach. Oh! And we could use up some of the garlic and green onions." They didn't have many vegetables, only enough to provide filling for various tarts and hors d'oeuvres, for his bagels and for a few breads he did. He liked his spinach sausage bread. It was the best of all breads. It was a white, fluffy crumb, and a rope of meaty, spicy sausage crumbed in the dough and a spiral of spinach pesto. He tended to pack some cheese in-between two slices and that was lunch, if he happened to be busy. Which, despite evidence otherwise, was most of the time.   
  
He put two red peppers on a sheet pan and popped them in the Wolf, giving the oven a loving pat on the dial, "Now, you be a good haunted tank. This is a present for Arthur. You'll like Arthur, he's durable."   
  
He swung around to take the puff pastry out of the freezer and plopping a half-sheet, lining it with parchment paper, giving it a quick spray of non-stick spray and taking one of the stiff, frozen sheets and laying it on the pan, sticking the rest away again, and going into the cooler for his spinach.   
  
"It's just that he hasn't responded to anything I've sent him."   
  
"It's been a day." Ariadne called back, "Put on your big girl pants, and if he doesn't call we'll get a giant thing of ice cream and talk about how cruel men are."   
  
"I can and will take you up on that offer." Eames called back, ripping the tiny leaves of baby spinach into ripping chunks and tossing those into the food processor. "And then you'll never be rid of me, and my tiny brunette obsession will move on to you, and it'll be very tragic."   
  
"You are so weird."

  
  


37

This time Arthur appeared at his door. Which made Eames worried that he'd somehow gotten sick and was now having a fever dream, which was distressing on many levels, not the least being that since he was sick he wouldn't be able to give hallucination Arthur a good time.   
  
"I'm taking you out on a date." Arthur said. "We're going now."   
  
"Can I dress up a bit first?" Eames was just slumming around in boring old jeans and a t-shirt. Where was the pizazz in that? The panache? The fierce distress in Arthur's eyes that could only be solved by the immediate removal of both of their clothing?   
  
"This is an improvement over whatever you're going to put on," Arthur stopped him smoothly. "Put on socks and shoes and a coat, and we'll go."   
  
Eames, who had no plans except to sit around and pine and maybe play Tetris for a year until he forgot what people were, obliged easily enough. He rather liked bossy Arthur, he rather especially liked bossy Arthur taking him out on a date. That was really the best sort of bossy Arthur. Eames was sort of lost in the level of Arthur's involvement between them, he was fairly sure Arthur thought he was utterly smashing, but it was hard to tell. Eames had long ago decided to err on the side of persistently charming and see where that got him.   
  
Arthur watched him get ready, didn't glance around the flat, didn't pick up anything and investigate, just stared like Eames' stomach was going to start playing Daffy Duck. Eames pulled on his cap and flicked off the lights.   
  
"Where are we going?" Eames locked the door behind him and they walked down to hall to the elevator.   
  
Arthur pressed the button, and then ushered Eames in with a hand to the small of his back, before looping Eames' arm in his own and lacing their fingers together. "It's a surprise."   
  
Eames nodded, and Arthur was frowning at the door, like he was trying to will the elevator to go at the speed Arthur wanted it to go. Eames simply enjoyed how close Arthur was to him, and when the elevator hulked to a halt Arthur once again lead him out and out into the frigid winter air.   
  
They stopped.   
  
Eames stopped   
  
Arthur was looking off at something yonder and then carefully cleared his throat. "You seem to like...this...sort of thing."   
  
"Romance?"   
  
"Cheesiness," Arthur cleared his throat again. "There are blankets in the back. It'll take us around the park and then to our next stop."   
  
Eames allowed himself to be shepherded in. Arthur sat down firmly next to him. Like he was going to  _ sit there _ like a  _ motherfucker _ . Eames didn't know quite how a motherfucker sat differently then a normal personally. Assumedly next to a mother he had recently fucked. Which Eames was not in any capacity, but Arthur sat down like he was making sure the entire world knew he was going to sit  _ right there _ , by God, and so fucking help anyone else who tried to sit there. Eames stretched out along the bench of the carriage and shamelessly wrapped his arm around Arthur's shoulders. Arthur didn't relax, exactly, but he settled in, at least, as the carriage began moving.   
  
Eames liked the clop of horsehooves. It was rhythmic and the world moved by slowly enough to enjoy, but not so sluggishly as to be dull.   
  
"Did you have our conversation picked out?" Eames asked, and Arthur nodded and pulled out the day's crossword and a tabledesk, putting it down on their thighs, then handed Eames the flashlight. "We're going to do the crossword, and we're going to be adorable while we do it."   
  
"Should I flutter my eyelashes frequently?"   
  
"If you like." Arthur agreed, "two down is ala." the clue being Chicken ____ King. Eames didn't quite get what was so great about crosswords, but it was sort of better with two people. It wasn't just yourself staring and looking at the frustrating little boxes and thinking of hedgemazes.

  
  


38

"26 across is Tri," Eames tried and Arthur looked up at him. Arthur filled in the 52 across Jolly, and Eames caught British Rocker Billy "Idol" and it was nice. They'd look up, frequently, peering out into the night, leaves fluttering down the sidewalks, and Arthur looked at the buildings. When they scooted by a residential area Eames grabbed Arthur's hand and doted "Let's get that one, honey."   
  
"But who will mow the lawn?" Arthur tutted, "And look at that tree, we'll never get any sunlight."   
  
"But Cigar will have so much room to romp."   
  
"Cigar has room to romp in a bathtub." Arthur retorted dryly. "But I do want a house in the city." He swallowed, glancing at Eames before filling in the "Raggedy" 18 down as Ann.   
  
"I do so hate the stiltedness of suburbia." Eames concurred, "And Cigar will get bigger, I assume, eventually. 45 across is playdough, by the way."   
  
Arthur hummed and then the crossword quickly became a reason to press that much closer, to rest their temples together, and for Eames to tug Arthur coat and point at funny shop name, for Arthur to glance over at Eames as they curled around the paper and the world may have been cold, but it didn't  _ feel _ cold, at that moment. Eames liked how the rocking of the carrier made them press together.   
  
"So does this count as a first date or a third?" Arthur asked, filling "Thailand" for "used to be Siam". "If we reset, I will have to start playing dirty."   
  
"You only like me for my body," Eames said, but Arthur's eyes came up and flicked up and down Eames and Eames could have eaten the swallow Arthur did then with a spoon and been satisfied for days. "Arthur, you haven't been thinking lewd thoughts about me, have you?" He whispered, low and private, looking around them as the streetlamps rocked by.   
  
Arthur stared at him, then tilted his head and they were kissing, snogging in the back of a horse drawn carriage, and Eames pulled them back against the chilly cushions and Arthur was warming up against his lips, the skin chapped. Eames did love kissing in somewhat public places, liked, more how close Arthur was practically snugged up against him, the way Arthur's tongue slid under his lip and the way Arthur kissed like he needed to know  _ everything _ .   
  
Eames made sure the blankets were tucked snug around Arthur, then slid a hand up the inside of Arthur's thigh underneath the blanket. The muscle twitched under his fingers, and he kept the touch light but indecent. Someday, someday in the future, someday when it was  _ warm _ , Eames would rub the hard line of Arthur's cock, slide along the aching heat of it like an old friend and Arthur would scowl, but Eames was sure he could get the expression to something soft and needy. He was sure of it.   
  
As was, he just curved his hand down between Arthur's legs, just until the side of his finger was pressing against Arthur's zipper and Arthur grabbed Eames by the scarf and held him in place, and there was nothing quiet or simple or anything here. It was only the cold and the fact that people could see them that was holding back Arthur's intensity, and Eames very real desire to commit fantastically deviant acts with the man who was petting his throat like he had  _ plans _ .

  
  


39

The coach slowed at a pace that allowed them to part before they embarrassed themselves. Not that Eames would have cared if they'd snogged for a bit longer, if he'd gotten to roll his knuckles against Arthur's zipper, if he could have found out the way Arthur's breathed when he wanted it. But Arthur pulled away with a wet, careful smack and he turned as Eames nuzzled into his neck.   
  
"We're here."   
  
Eames didn't look up for awhile, because no where they could be could possibly be more interesting then the smell of Arthur's skin. It didn't smell like apples, people, in general, should not smell like fruit and Eames got mildly confused about what to do with people who did (should he...bake...them?), but it was reminiscent of winesnap apples. It was the implication of similar attributes, a layer crisp sweetness, but something tantalizing spicy and musky underneath, creeping through the layers of scent until it lived in Eames' nostrils like the broaching flavor of winter.   
  
Arthur tugged him out of the carriage by the scarf, thanked the driver with a nod and a tip and then continued walking, like dragging Eames by the scarf was the socially appropriate answer to leading him around places.   
  
"I'm a sight bigger than your dog," Eames offered, "not that I mind if you want to lead me around."   
  
Arthur tightened his fingers in the wool, and looked at Eames through the corner of his eye. "I was wondering if you'd go for an innuendo or Cigar comment, there."   
  
"I'm versatile." Eames agreed and then they stopped. Arthur was standing on the wooden perimeter of the playground. The park was, technically, closed after sundown, so no kids. The popular drug dealing spot was up on 3rd at the gas station (and here, by drugs, Eames meant marijuana), the popular make out points ("Make-out points, Eames? Seriously?") were near the lake, and if this city had whores Eames hadn't the slightest where they were. He'd only found the coven of fucking teenagers on accident. So the playground was empty of all innocent and corrupt influences, except the two of them.   
  
Arthur looked at him a moment, then dimpled with a quiet sort of satisfaction, and bolted across the playfoam (recycled rubber bits-really, America? Really? He'd played on pebbled all of his childhood, and he was  _ fine _ .) covered area, ducked under the swinging bridge and Eames took off after him without a thought. Arthur bolted up the stairs and Eames clamored up the railing and stomped behind him as Arthur's thinner frame allowed him to squeeze down the slide. Eames jumped off the plastic castle at the top of the slide, but Arthur was still moving. He didn't know what they were doing, but Arthur leapt over the swings, and looped up and over and around the jungle gym and when they came to the tire tower, he didn't climb up it. He didn't crawl into it, was just  _ flying _ into it, like he was a lion at the circus, or perhaps a better metaphor, and Eames ran and crawled to the top.   
  
When Arthur burst out the other side, he turned and looked up.   
  
"I am the King." Eames announced.   
  
"The hell you are." Arthur was scrambling up the side like some sort of svelte, suited mountain goat and they didn't wrestle, because 100% recycled playfoam or no, Eames was an old bones and he didn't want to deal with the hospital.   
  
"Do you often come to frolic in the playground?"   
  
Arthur hopped from one of the lower tire towers to another, watching Eames. "No."   
  
"You look like you often come to frolic." Eames crouched, balancing on the inner curve of the tire as Arthur hopped and walked. "You seem to have a way about the place."   
  
Arthur kicked the tire and cleared his throat. "Cigar likes the slides. And the swings."   
  
"Of course he does." Eames nodded sagely. "It's all for the love of your impossibly small dog. Do you also go to carnivals because he likes the Ferris wheel?"   
  
Arthur cleared his throat again and turned to look out over to the pathway into the woods. "They wouldn't let him on."

  
  


40

"You just weren't sneaky enough. Which, I'm not sure how, since you could hide him in your trouser pocket, but, well." Eames sat down and Arthur reached up to grab his ankle. It was a cool pressure, seeing as Arthur had thick gloves on, and Eames had thick woolen socks on. But Eames could look down, and there Arthur's hand would be. On his ankle.   
  
"I didn't have any date ideas." Arthur admitted, eventually. "I don't...date."   
  
"Well, I will say my comprehension of modern dating involves a lot more snogging in your parent's basement, so I might be a  _ bit _ old fashioned."   
  
"No, I mean...I don't date. I have never dated. Not..." Arthur blew a frustrated breath out of his nose, like it was actually  _ painful _ for him to talk about himself. But Eames was quiet and didn't press. "I don't date." he finished after a moment and then he looked up at Eames, the liquid of his eyes shining in the streetlamps and Eames offered a smile.   
  
"Well. Now you can't say that anymore, can you?" Eames offered.   
  
Arthur nodded, and then jumped down from the tower and wandered over to the swings. He grabbed the chains and hoisted himself up, standing on the rubber curve that dipped sharply under his weight and rocking gently to-and-fro.   
  
"How are you enjoying dating, thus far?" Eames climbed down and curled his hands around the chain nearer Arthur's knees.   
  
"I don't like romance plots. In books. I mean." Arthur kept swinging. "It just annoyed me that everything would suddenly just sort of narrow down, like that. I just wanted them to focus and defeat the bad guy, or save the world, or what have you, and they kept getting side tracked."   
  
"And do you need to be getting around to throwing the ring into the fire, then, Frodo? Am I distracting you from your Destiny."   
  
Arthur craned his neck, and then gripped more tightly to the rubber covered chains, and then hoisted his legs right up and perpendicular to his body, before carefully, smoothly lowering him to sit in the swing. "I don't  _ get _ distracted."   
  
"But that's the  _ fun _ part of life." Eames grabbed Arthur by the shoulders and spun his around, the supports twisting around and Arthur's legs tucking in so as not to scuff his shoes."What's the fun of paychecks and bills if you don't go out and gamble a bit?" He let go and Arthur planted his feet.   
  
"You really aren't going to be the baker who sweeps into my life and changes how I look at the world."   
  
Eames just grinned and Arthur got up and let the swing spin it's way to homeostasis. "You're really not."   
  
"I'm merely stating, that you simply need to dream a  _ little _ weirder, darling."   
  
"Oh I think you broke the bank on weird. I think we have a perfectly sufficient amount of weird, Chef Eames. I shan't be buying any more of  _ that _ today."   
  
"We can have weirdness osmosis. It will be wonderful. The Maxwell's Demon of weird gave facilitate a transfer of weird from me to you."   
  
"Eames, I have a dog who lives in a shoe and I run head of house for a Steampunk Bistro, I think that is payment enough of weirdness dues."   
  
"Weirder, darling. We can get so much weirder and, here. We're going to be ridiculously, disgustingly soppy. You ready?" He crouched down in front of Arthur. "Come on. Climb on."   
  
"You'll throw out your back."   
  
"I'm going to carry you about and it will be dramatic and awe-inspiring."   
  
"You'll throw out your back and I will not get fucked tonight."   
  
"And you'll sort of nearly choke me and we'll fall down laughing."   
  
"You will throw out your back and I will twist my ankle, and we'll be lying in the cold grass while we wait for Yusuf to get us, because Yusuf is the only person I know who will be awake."   
  
"Get  _ on _ ." Eames insisted and Arthur just reached under Eames to grab his scarf and tug him along.   
  
"The next time you tell me that, your pants had better be off, or  _ so help you _ ."   
  
"You only want me for my cock. This is abuse. If I knew how to live without you I would leave now."   
  
"Are you  _ ever _ serious."   
  
Eames swung an arm around Arthur's shoulders. "There's rather a difference between being serious and being dour. You? Are stodgy and dour and that works for you. I, however, cannot manage that, so I go for dashing rapscallion."

  
  


41

Arthur gave him a scathing look and Eames just tucked him in closer under his arm.   
  
"It's like this, darling. You can either think love is this huge, dramatic crescendo with the sunset setting behind your every kiss and violins playing whenever your hands touch, and the whole thing is doomed for one reason or another-he's too good for you, you think you love him more than he loves you, he'll shave his head and move to Guam and you'll never hear from him again-"   
  
"What goes  _ on in your head _ ?"   
  
"-and yes, okay, there is something delectable about making every single inconsequential thing matter and thinking yours is the romance that will define a generation,  _ but _ it gets exhausting, after awhile, all that melodrama and need, doesn't it?" Eames turned his head and Arthur's face was too close to look at properly, but that was okay. Eames very nearly had it memorized, anyways. "Or, you can find something a little warmer, and less harrowing. I will be perfectly happy if they don't write novels about us, and we don't get muffins the second we walk into a coffeeshop, and not having giant passionate fights about jam jars and then fucking them out on the rug."   
  
"I don't like muffins."   
  
"That's because you're an evil cyborg from another dimension, but that's fine. I will teach you the ways of love, my delectable kill-bot." Eames reached to tickle under his chin and Arthur recoiled and glowered up at him, and Eames just smiled, because he was  _ hilarious _ .   
  
"I don't even know why I like you." Arthur curled one finger into Eames' belt loop.   
  
"Ah, but the important thing here is that you  _ do _ like me."   
  
"You better be amazing in bed."   
  
"I am." Eames promised and then kissed Arthur's temples, because it was there and it looked sad. Eames would worship at Arthur's temple. He'd worship it good and worshiped.   
  
They move to a bench and Arthur snuggles in deep to his warm coat and Eames stares up at the sky, even though the stars are covered with a thick, grey blanket of clouds.   
  
"So," Arthur says after awhile. "You left a note in my pie this week."   
  
Eames doesn't reply, doesn't turn to Arthur, but he does tuck his arm more tightly about his shoulders and fiddle with the line of Arthur's lapel.   
  
"Dom's donation was on the news, which you saw and were then to chickenshit to tell me about, huh?"   
  
"Discreet. I was too  _ discreet _ ." Eames corrected.   
  
Arthur huffed, then just breathed under Eames arm, for awhile. Eames had rather hoped he'd go on, but Arthur just sat, quiet, and he thought maybe that was sort of lovely too. Eames reached into Arthur pocket and pulled out the iPod, handing an earbud to Arthur before settling the other in his own ear. He handed it over for Arthur to click through.   
  
"Do you still like dancing?" Eames asked as Arthur fiddled with the click wheel.   
  
Arthur paused looking at the screen until the backlight faded. "Eames, we aren't going to be like that."   
  
"Like what?"   
  
"You saw them dance?" Arthur looked up, "Dom and Mal?"   
  
Eames nodded and Arthur looked at him, "We aren't going to be like that."   
  
Eames was fairly sure he was missing something and Arthur hadn't moved.   
  
"Do you want something like that?" Eames asked, eventually and Arthur went back to his iPod.   
  
"No," Arthur said, scrolling through his music before Lee Wiley clicked on and Eames settled back against the cold, sharp angles of the bench.   
  
"Good."   
  
"You don't even know what I mean." Arthur tucked the mp3 player back in his coat.   
  
Eames moved his arm to Arthur's waist as the chorus rang  _ let's fly away...let's fly away _ , and escorted his away from the playground. "We're going rogue."   
  
"Are we now?"   
  
"I'm going to take you somewhere you've never been before." Eames swore and then extracted his ear bud, tucked the whole hit and kaboodle away, took Arthur's hand, and began running before Arthur could summon up and snappy retort.   
  
Eames would promptly be damned if he let nostalgia ruin their third date.

  
  


42

It was actually very easy to break into the Planetarium. It was an exhibit at the zoo, which was mostly focused on guarding the animals and gift shop and such, and didn't figure anyone wanted in on some extracurricular astronomy. Oh sure there were cameras about and locks and the computer starting the program had a password, but like every computer everywhere that needed to be accessed by quite a few underpaid college students, the password was scribbled on a paper nearby and he entered it. From there it was a clearly labeled desktop item and Arthur helpfully turned on the projectors.   
  
Eames turned the audio off after a few befuddled clicks around the program, then the stars glimmer up across the vast ceiling of the planetarium, dark and still around them. Eames picked his way over to Arthur, and then the two of them lay on top of their coats and looked up at the slowly moving constellations. It was cool in the auditorium, but warmer than it was outside, and something about the pitch blackness and the projected stars was more expansive than the night sky. Or, maybe not expansive. Maybe it was that feeling of endlessness that came from being alone. Like you could be more now that no one was looking.   
  
Eames liked that this was, for a moment, their own private sky.   
  
"Whatever you are thinking is too soppy to exist." Arthur said, in a long sigh that was bigger than the entire room was.   
  
"Mmm." Eames agreed. "Which is why I never say the things I think out loud. It would be embarrassing."   
  
Arthur was a few inches away, but they were in their shirt sleeves, and Eames could hear him breathing, and smell him and he turned to his side to slide a proprietary hand over Arthur's stomach. The cashmere of his sweater was soft and slippery under Eames' hand, his muscles tensing under Eames' palm, but it was warm and Eames stroking his thumb along the dip of his sternum and he didn't know if Arthur was looking at him or not, but his breathing quickened and Eames smiled to himself.   
  
Arthur's nipple was hard under the thin material of his sweater and dress shirt, Eames just barely brushed it and Arthur's chest jerked sharply with a harsh intake of air and Eames paused, wondering if Arthur was flushing, if his eyes were open or closed and he settled a little bit closer. He deliberately brushed his thumb over Arthur's nipple again and Arthur momentarily pushed up into it, just a tiny, barely noticeable little moment, and Eames settled his head on Arthur's shoulder, to better listen to the quickened thrum of his heart and touch the tip of his pointer finger to the tip of the hard little bud under the cloth.   
  
Arthur didn't say anything, and Eames slowly manipulated his finger in a small, tight little circle. Arthur readjusted on the floor, and curled in towards Eames, settling a hand on his side, but not doing anything, it was just warm and reassuring.   
  
He wondered exactly how hard Arthur would kill him if Eames were to, say, at some hypothetical future point, climb on top of him and rub off on the material of one of his sweaters. Eames, personally, thought it was a compliment, but they were probably Dry Clean Only or some such nonsense. But it'd be worth it for the during, wouldn't it? Arthur writhing and needy under him, and Eames rubbing off against the silky, sliding material of his favorite v-neck? That sounded like a good time to Eames.   
  
Arthur gave a long, singular shudder when Eames caught the nipple between his pointer and middle finger, tugging it lightly. Eames flattened his hand and dragged it back to Arthur navel.

  
  


43

"Tonight," Arthur swallowed. "I am going to tie you to my bed and make you pay for every cock-teasing thing you've done." His voice was quiet and Eames peeked upwards at the glimmering lights of the summer sky in the Western Hemisphere and Eames slipped his hand under Arthur's jumper and then slipped two fingers in the gap between buttons of his dress shirt and petted his stomach.   
  
"You're just digging yourself deeper." Arthur warned.   
  
"Mmm," Eames agreed kissing Arthur's throat, "deeper and deeper and  _ deeper _ ."   
  
Arthur slapped his arm, and tried to turn away in disgust, but he didn't mean it, so Eames just rolled him back around. and Eames laughed.   
  
"You're going to be like this the entire time, aren't you?" Arthur said.   
  
"Devastatingly sexy? Yes, unfortunately. Your life is so hard."   
  
"I was angling for something along the lines of  _ irritating _ ..." Arthur jerked as Eames dug a nail into the soft skin of his belly. "You aren't actually proving me wrong, here."   
  
"I'm fun. I'll stop you from taking sex too seriously. You have charts don't you? I can sense it. You'll make spreadsheets about how I spread your over the sheets."   
  
Arthur started to get up and Eames laughed and rolled on top of him.   
  
"No, no, I can't. I have standards." Arthur struggled and so Eames did the logical thing and blew a raspberry into Arthur's neck. Arthur froze and Eames used the moment to settle down a bit more, before he realized Arthur was laughing.   
  
He wasn't making a noise, but he was shaking, and when Eames put a hand to Arthur's face he could feel the deep divot of a dimple and Arthur turned his head away.   
  
"Breathe Darling, you need to breathe." Eames took yoga breaths for him. "Come on, breathing is good for you. My standards are very firm in that my partner be capable of consent. That includes breathing."   
  
But that just made Arthur laugh harder, soundlessly into the floor. Eames wanted the lights on so badly he would have sold a testicle, but maybe that was why Arthur was laughing. Maybe he liked laughing in the dark. and he curled up on his side in a little ball and Eames rubbed exaggeratedly soothing circles on Arthur's back.   
  
"Shh, it's fine. You've just gone round the bend. Let it happen."   
  
Arthur just laughed, hysterical little squeaks popping out as he gasped and Eames thought he'd strain something in his cheek, because he was smiling so hard.   
  
Arthur didn't calm down at once, but rather settle and then move and start another short bout of laughter, before one final hiccup of sound and he was done. Eames was happily spooned behind him and Arthur took a moment to wipe his eyes and sigh. "I need to kill you now. You have witnessed too much."   
  
"I go to my grave smug and happy."   
  
Arthur settled back and then rolled over and up and Eames was on his back, wanting, again, to see the expression on Arthur's face.   
  
"We're going back to mine now." Arthur told him, "because I'll need to feed Cigar, and he likely thinks I'm dead because I've been out of sight for more than thirteen seconds."   
  
"Tragic."   
  
"And then, after a brief bout of unnecessary small talk and maybe a beer, I'm going to make you earn a fourth date. And maybe then I'll let you go home, and maybe not."   
  
"On my knees?" Eames asked.   
  
"If you take it like a man, I'll buy you dinner." Arthur promised, solemn.   
  
"Charming." Eames fumbled up Arthur's arm and tucked his fingers into Arthur's shirt collar, just for the feeling of Arthur's skin. "What if I want to make  _ you _ earn the fourth date? Hmm? I could play hard to get."   
  
"We really don't have time for me to start laughing again." Arthur swallowed against Eames' fingers. "You've shown your hand Chef Eames."   
  
"Have I?" Eames plunged his fingers in a bit further so he could feel the hardness of Arthur's collarbone against the backs of his nails. "I thought I was playing it cool."   
  
"Eames." Arthur said very seriously, "If you do not take me home  _ right now _ and have sex with me, I'm going to get upset."   
  
Eames stroked his fingers in one, long, lingering slide before rolling them up and sorting out their coats. "Well. Then I'd best get you home, shouldn't I?"   
  
"Yes, I think you'd better had." Arthur grabbed him by the scarf and left the stars rotating silently in their own private sky.

  
  


44

First times could either be big deals, or they could be natural. They could be effigies of rose petals and hot baths and candles and wax and silk sheets, full of low jazz music and erectile dysfunction from stress. Or, they could just sort of happen, slide from stillness to happening like there wasn't a transition needed. Maybe there were some gradients in there, but really, even if the big deal happened squeezed up in some gas stop loo, they were still, in essence, big deals. And even if the natural things were preplanned, they still slid easy as cakes out of a well floured pan, dropped and went and perfected themselves by existing.   
  
Eames didn't really know which it was going to be. You never really knew before you got there, never really knew until one of you was standing there naked save one sock, and the other still had his shirt half-on and the lights were on too bright and there was all your stuff strewn about, or all his, the bed right there and everything smashed up with need and embarrassment and second-guessing and perception.   
  
Arthur got them back to his, the park not far from his flat and bistro and fine dining on the other side of the street. They went around back and up the stairs, Arthur opened the door, fist still tight in Eames scarf as he dragged Eames into the familiar confines of his living room. Both of them stepped carefully over an expectant Cigar, and Arthur's hand loosened and he bent to scoop his dog up. Cigar panted into Arthur's cheek before turning and looking at Eames, tail wagging like it wanted to fly its way to the moon.   
  
Eames came over and stroked his thumb over Cigar's head. "Poor guy, had a long day, has he?"   
  
Arthur rubbed a thumb and forefinger over Cigar's ear and Cigar turned back to him, licking Arthur's jaw. "I can get you a drink, if you..." Arthur adjusted to cradle Cigar in his other arm. "He just..."   
  
"Oh my all means, smother your dog in affection while I watch."   
  
"He's still young." Arthur dimpled as Cigar clambered up to his shoulder and panted, looking around the room. Arthur bent himself awkwardly to comply, and Cigar peered about atop his mighty perch on the vast and previously unconquered Mount Arthur Is Secretly a Giant FluffyBasket. "He's not used to me leaving for very long yet. I usually try to visit once an hour when I'm at work, if we're not busy."   
  
Eames settled onto one of the easy chairs and relaxed into the warmth of the apartment and Arthur moving about the kitchen, making Cigar's dinner from scratch.   
  
Cigar wiggled and Arthur put him down, and Cigar romped (it took him several romps) to Eames and stood atop his shoe.   
  
"Hello darling." He plucked the small dog up, "Where has your shoe gone to?"   
  
Cigar's ears perked and he looked down at Eames shirt, sniffing frantically.   
  
"I believe he and his shoe had a fight earlier, wherein shoe got stuck sideways in the door and Cigar couldn't pull him out."   
  
"Well that won't do." Eames got up and padded around to Arthur's bedroom, putting the powder blue (slightly bedraggled) shoe upright and then frowning, looking inside of it. The toe was packed with treats, but not full ones, no, just half each.   
  
"Arthur, Cigar seems to think that shoe needs to eat."   
  
"Maybe he's just saving them for later."

  
  


45

"No, I'm pretty sure he's decided sharing is caring." Eames put Cigar and shoe down, and Cigar bit down on one of the laces and gleefully dragged Shoe forward in slow tugging little jerks.   
  
"Well that's settled then." Eames said as Arthur put Cigars food in his bowl and then looked up at him. "I wouldn't be able to perform knowing the most defining romance of our time was on the rocks."   
  
Arthur just looked at him from his position, crouched on the floor, scratching the loose skin of Cigar's back, before rolling into a stand. Eames watched and stood his ground as Arthur moved forward. Eames watched, because when it came to Arthur that seemed safest. He didn't always  _ do _ what was safest, of course, because then life would be no fun, but at the moment it was prudent to just...watch.   
  
Arthur pushed Eames back into the chair, then his knees hit the thin space between the chair arms and Eames' thighs, his arm slid over the top of the seat till his hand was against the wall and his face tantalizing close to Eames' own.   
  
"Eames." He greeted.   
  
"Arthur," Eames returned. "Do you find it faintly ridiculous that we only call each other by the one name?"   
  
"I find everything to do with you to be faintly ridiculous." Arthur rejoined and then untucked Eames scarf and opened his shirt. The bruise Arthur had left was extremely faint, just a few bare traces of brown and yellow and Arthur rubbed his thumb over the spot. Eames titled his head to the side agreeably and Arthur inhaled sharply.   
  
"Do you want to make a bargain?" Arthur asked, quiet, agaisnt his ear and Eames looked down the long line of Arthur's body, folded over his own, the sweep of his coat, entranced, suddenly, by the fabric of Arthur's coat. Black and cloth and glimmering with water droplets and the occasional copper fur.   
  
"Is it for my soul?" Eames asked. "I'm not saying no, if it is, I'd just like some warning."   
  
Arthur huffed, "A pawn shop wouldn't take your soul, condition it's in."   
  
"My soul is  _ effulgent _ ." Eames slipped a hand to rest right above Arthur's waistband. "And effervescent. And efflorescent."   
  
Arthur blinked. Eames could feel the drag of lashes against his temple. "Your soul has turned to powder from a lack of water?"   
  
"I meant more that it was flowering." Eames inhaled at the line of Arthur's jaw. "Envision, entirely, the energetic entreaty of enviable, effervescent ebullience enfolding your...eccentric equanimity... in enforced, environmentally economic easy eternities; eventually ebbing into ecstasy."   
  
Arthur paused a moment then slowly asked, "Did you just say you want our souls to have sex in confinement forever?"   
  
"I was more trying to explain my soul's perfection, in that it will consume you with it's pristine awesomeness, utilizing only e words, but if you'd like, your way works too. Are you impressed?"   
  
"The letter e has lost all meaning, does that count?" Arthur slid his hand over Eames' mouth. "Also I think you need to stop talking. Here is my deal. I think you've been teasing me on purpose, haven't you? And that is rather rude, Chef Eames."   
  
Eames rather liked the hard pressure of Arthur's hand over his mouth, actually. Even if it smelled like beef and dog.   
  
"But I think sexual compatibility is important to see if a relationship will work in the long run. So we're having sex tonight, you agree with that? Nod or shake your head."   
  
Eames nodded, tracing one of the lines of Arthur's palm with his tongue. Arthur didn't comment and his long fingers stroked over the side of Eames face.   
  
"Good." Eames could feel the smile against his jaw and he rubbed his thumb along the bump of Arthur's ribs.

  
  


46

"So here's the deal. You need to earn a fourth date. On said fourth date you can ask me one question about myself and I will tell you."   
  
Eames clutched on Arthur's side, because the thought of asking Arthur any one of the thousands of questions he thought and obsessed about daily and  _ getting an answer _ was thrilling in a terrible, glorious, horrible, beautiful way.   
  
"However, that means tonight I need to get back at you for being such an horrible cocktease. So here is what we're going to do."   
  
Eames was already hard in trousers from Arthur being close, and demanding, for the smell of his skin, the heat of his body, and the low, quite instruction of Arthur's voice.   
  
"Since you made me wait through three dates you get to wait too."   
  
Arthur removed his hand and slipped his thumb into Eames mouth and Eames agreeably sucked on it, And Arthur leaned back to watch him. "You can do what you want to me, but you can't take your pants off. Can't even unzip them, can't come. You're going to walk home hard and jerk off the second you get in the door, right in your hallway, because you won't be able to stand it. Understood?"   
  
Eames twined his tongue around Arthur's thumb, portrayed his acquiescence with his mouth and Arthur settled down and stroked through Eames' hair. "Good."   
  
He removed his hand and slid off Eames lap. "Bedroom."   
  
Eames agreed and Arthur dragged him up, pushed him forward, into the bedroom and then down on the bed. Arthur closed the door with his foot and flicked on the lamps on either side of his bed. Not as glaring and exposed as an overhead, but not the dark, awkward shadows of one lamp, or none at all. Eames got off his shoes and sock, tucking the socks into his shoes before Arthur came forward and dragged his coat, scarf and t-shirt off.   
  
Eames pushed Arthur's coat off, together they dragged Arthur out of his sweater, leaving Arthur's hair in a ruffled upheaval and then, because he could, Eames dropped to his knees. He leaned forward to Arthur's stomach and slipped the button through the buttonhole with his teeth. He bent down to spend a moment mouth the line of Arthur's cock through his trousers, Arthur hand sharp in Eames' hair and their breathing jagged like cliff rocks.   
  
He undid Arthur's belt, slowly, slipping the leather out of the belt loops and leaving the long stripe of black coiled tight on the floor. He tilted his head to undo the trouser button, to drag the zip tooth by tooth to the bottom, inhale musk and sweat and relishing Arthur's hand tightening in his hair.   
  
He kept his hands tight on Arthur's hips to stop Arthur's trousers falling off, and then abandoned Arthur's cock-momentarily, he would be back-and turned to Arthur's dress shirt, that was between him and Arthur's  _ skin _ , and had hatefully been so  _ all evening _ . He rolled up undoing each button, Arthur staring down at him, breathing like he might forget how, until Eames had the last one undone with a neat scrape of teeth.   
  
Arthur grabbed his face and kissed him like he needed to win something, find something, like he could figure out everything if he just kissed Eames thoroughly enough. Eames pushed Arthur's coat off, leaving it crumpled on the floor. Eames turned his head as Arthur's mouth slid wet, hot,  _ willing _ down his cheek, to pick up each of Arthur's wrist in turn, undoing the tiny mother of pearl cuff button and then nuzzled past the fabric to drag his teeth over the skin of Arthur wrist, feeling Arthur's heatbeat against his lips   
  
Arthur slipped out of his shift, it slithered off him and Eames needed his hands on the plane of pale skin, needed to touch, Arthur stood there, hair in points, body all in juts and angles and Eames wanted to find the soft bits of him, the places he melted and ran together, where everything wasn't so viciously outlined, but smeared and hazy like a charcoal drawing, or flour over a pastry cloth. Eames traced the definition of Arthur's pectoral, the indentation of his ribs.

  
  


47

"Get on the bed." Arthur gestured and Eames slid back down, inching his way to the headboard. Arthur removed his trousers with a shake and then, as gracefully as any man could be expected to, removed his pants and Eames dug his fingers into the nearby pillow. Arthur ran a hand through his hair before slowly kneewalking up the bed and settling down, with a deliberating, teasing pressure, into Eames lap.   
  
Arthur could test Eames all he wanted. He'd succeed.   
  
"So, are there rules to what I can do to you  _ outside _ of whipping it out or getting off?"   
  
Arthur shrugged, "If I don't like it, you'll know."   
  
Eames wanted to savor this, wanted  _ Arthur _ to be savored, since he liked his food savory, so he hefted Arthur up over his shoulder as Arthur flailed briefly as Eames got his way up. "Eames, you don't need to steal me from my village to ravish me amongst your barbarian horde."   
  
"Which way is your bathroom?"   
  
"You couldn't have asked that before picking me up?"   
  
Eames kissed Arthur's arse cheek, "No, not really."   
  
"Door on your right." Arthur huffed as Eames went in and flicked the light. The lights here, were blaring, and Eames let Arthur slither down and bent to the bathtub to plug the drain and run the taps.   
  
"How hot do you like it?"   
  
Arthur stared at him a moment then shoved Eames over to fix the water himself. "A bath?"   
  
"To start with." Eames agreed and helped Arthur into the tub, getting up the cabinet to rifle through Arthur's things. None of the fancy stuff Eames preferred (shame, Eames would have to show Arthur a brave new world of bath products  _ later _ ) but he did find Arthur's shampoo, soap and a fluffy, thick washcloth, so he  _ supposed _ that would do. For the moment.   
  
He waited until the water was as high as the bath would allow it, shut off the taps and dunked Arthur's head under the water. Arthur continued to look at him as if he was an alien robot in disguise, but then his eyes closed in bliss as Eames rubbed the shampoo through his hair. He kept his fingers firm, and Arthur let out the tiniest little breath of a moan at the treatment.

  
  


48

The suds are thick and white, and Arthur's hair slowly loosens from the rigid spikes and planes he's kept it in, to something twining and soft. He relaxed against the back of the tub and Eames slowly had his sink under the water again. Arthur came back up and wiped the water out of his eyes. "You don't actually ever want to have sex, do you? if you’re asexual but not aromantic you should tell me. We can work something out."   
  
Eames paused and then dipped the washcloth into the water and started to scrub up a good lather. "Would you really?"   
  
Arthur offered his arm and Eames began carefully washing each finger, over the palm and circling to the back of the hand. "It wouldn't be a first." Arthur watched as Eames carefully washed his arm, raised it as Eames dipped into his armpit and continued looking at him as if Eames had completely lost the plot.   
  
"I am  _ very _ interested, darling." Eames promised, leaning up to get Arthur shoulder, the long line of his neck, and Arthur closed his eyes so Eames could utilize and unused section of washcloth to wash Arthur's face. "I just like to take time about these sorts of things."   
  
Arthur cleared off his face and Eames bent to Clean Arthur's chest, not really trying to arouse him, he just liked the heat of the water turning Arthur's skin pink, the water gleaming off his muscles, the way Arthur lounged in the bath.   
  
When he got to Arthur's back he paused, hand on the long cord of scar tissue echoing up from Arthur's hip curving up his skin. It was still pinkish, not that old, but not new enough to be angry red, or shiny pink. He bent and kissed it, and since Arthur didn't offer a comment, Eames didn't say anything either, just continued washing. Arthur relaxed, slightly, and that was the first Eames noticed he had been nervous.   
  
"Lift your leg, darling." Eames said.   
  
Arthur placed his foot on the bottom of the tub and Eames crowded over him, gently washing between Arthur's legs, and Arthur let out a slow sort of sigh As Eames washed Arthur slowly started rocking back and Eames kissed his shoulder.   
  
"Do you know what I'm going to do to you?"   
  
Arthur rolled onto his back and Eames cradled his ankle in his hand, smoothing his thumb down the line of the bone and Arthur watched him, Arthur could be suitably depended on to watch everything, eyes sharp and dark and knowing.   
  
"What?" Arthur asked, as Eames washed warm and wet along the inside his thigh.   
  
Eames smiled and kissed the arch of Arthur's foot. "Make you wish you hadn't made your rule. I'll follow it, even if you ask me not to, but you're really rather going to want me to fuck you by the time I'm done."   
  
Arthur shrugged and switched legs easily, Eames washing between each toe and down and over the calf, relishing the tight strength of the muscle and Arthur stretching out in the tub, warm and indulgent. Eames drains the tub and tugs him out. Arthur steps out and reaches for the towel, but Eames is already behind him, licking the water off the divet of his spine and Arthur laughs. "You aren't going to get it all."   
  
" _ Try _ me." Eames said, lipping up dripping streams of water off Arthur's neck from where it was trailing down his neck. "You said we could have a drink and make small talk. I'm having a drink."   
  
"Did you do that entire thing just for the joke?" Arthur looked to the bed, rubbing his hair from soaked to damp and Eames liked how they looked in the mirror, Arthur flushed and smiling to himself, hair in all sorts of waves and points, Eames behind him, hands on his hips, sucking water off him like he was thirsty for it. He liked, especially the way Arthur's eyes caught him in the mirror and he rolled into Eames' space, tight, for a blissful second, before putting his towel in the hamper and back into the bathroom.   
  
"Now or never Chef Eames." Arthur called. "Turn the light off."   
  
Eames walked into the bedroom, flicked the bathroom light off and was greeted to Arthur stretching in one delectable long movement, then slithering onto the bed, rolling over and looking perfectly unashamed and Eames delighted in it. Arthur shifted until he was comfortable, leg up and cocked open, eyes on Eames like he didn't know how to see anything else.

  
  


49

Eames got on the bed, stalking over Arthur's legs and settling neatly over him. "If we were teenagers, I would sneak into your window every chance I got just to make out with you." Eames pressed a kiss between Arthur's eyebrows, kissed the one that liked arching at him in confusion, the second one because it looked sad that it didn't get attention.   
  
"Stalling tactic," Arthur said and Eames snapped his teeth in the air above Arthur's nose. Arthur sighed and pressed his upraised leg against the fly of Eames' trousers. Eames shuddered, and his hips hitched before he could entirely stop himself. Arthur smirked at him and Eames bent down and wrapped his lips around that delightfully sensitive nipple he'd been introduced to earlier. Arthur's leg halted from the slow rubbing tease and Eames sucked, licking the circumference of Arthur's areola and Arthur ran his fingers through Eames' hair.   
  
"If we were teenagers," Arthur admitted, "I would jack off thinking about your mouth."   
  
"You don't now?" Eames licked water from the dip in Arthur's clavicle. "Shame."   
  
Arthur tugged him up for a more proper kiss and Eames melted into it readily, imagining himself at seventeen with his projected mental image of seventeen year old Arthur, sneaking into his window and sloppily frottaging in the back of his car until the pristine, good boy Valedictorian Arthur was a sobbing, wrecked mess. Eames would have loved to have been the one to first kiss Arthur, first fuck him, first been the one to see how he looked falling apart and  _ needing _ .   
  
But.   
  
He slipped down Arthur's body, wet and warm and flushed as it was and nuzzled up his cock. It twitched against his lips, and his mouth was already filling with saliva. He raised a hand to fondle at Arthur's scrotum then lowered his mouth over Arthur's cock, looking up at Arthur's face. Arthur legs had spread open, and his eyes blinked, slow, lethargic, before resting again on Eames.   
  
"Go on then." Arthur said, "Suck."   
  
Eames hallowed out his cheeks, and placed a hand on Arthur's hip. Arthur huffed, but didn't quite give in to just that. Eames lifted one of Arthur’s legs up and over his shoulder, kneading the muscle, bobbing slow and quick, saliva dribbling out of the corners of his mouth, but he didn't care, he  _ did not care _ , because Arthur was breathing harder, leg twitching against Eames' shoulder.   
  
Eames looked up at Arthur's flushed face and began humming, cheerfully, and Arthur hit his head against the pillow. "Eames if you get me off humming  _ God Save The Queen _ , I'm sure you can- _ ah _ -guess who God will  _ not _ be able to save." He didn't sound all that upset, so Eames decided he was just the type to enjoying threatening people, and who was he to stand in the way of that?   
  
He pulled up until he was just sucking on the leaking head and Arthur growled, but didn't shove or thrust up too much. Eames let him go and Arthur flopped back onto the bed. "You are a tease. Even when we're fucking you are  _ still a tease _ ."   
  
"Only a tease if I don't intend to deliver." Eames promised, "Now rolls over darling."   
  
"Why?"   
  
"I'm going to eat you out until you can't handle it anymore," Eames said and rolled Arthur over and pulled his arse up into the air.   
  
"Eat me...what-"   
  
Eames decided that the ideal education was practical demonstration. And Arthur's arse was everything he had dreamed of, obsessing over it in those tight trousers. It was just as lush, just as rich and warm and plump and inviting as he had pictured it. He didn't even need to spread him open, the muscles were defined enough that Eames could just nuzzle his way in and begin with a single, tasting lick.   
  
Arthur gripped the sheets and Eames smirked, twisting his tongue instead Arthur's body, just to hear the beautiful little mewl that Arthur tried to swallow and failed. Eames sucked on the tight ring of muscles and Arthur thrust back against him.

  
  


50

Arthur pushed back against him, and Eames traces the wrinkles and puckering of Arthur's hole, giving it every last bit of attentive devotion he had given the rest of Arthur, but focused, And Arthur just started panting, and Eames was pretty much addicted to the way Arthur was pushing back into the thrust of his tongue, the way that Arthur bit into his fist when Eames reached forward and rubbed his tongue against the nub of Arthur's prostrate, the way he just started cursing as his hole got wet and fluttering and loose.   
  
"F-fuck." Arthur cursed and his hips had relaxed, pelvis barely off the sheets, cock rubbing faintly at the linen, hips twitching and body rolling and everything about him incapable of stillness. It was like ...Eames was out of analogies. He didn't know what it was like, it just had to be experienced to be understood. Like going into space or something. Oh there was one. There was an analogy.   
  
"What even-"   
  
Eames got his fingers wet before slowly sliding them into the clingingly sopping heat of Arthur's body. "You've not gotten rimmed before? With this arse. Now that's a crime."   
  
Arthur swallowed and tried to square his knees underneath him, but Eames took a great amount of pride in the fact that he didn't seem able to get the trick of it. Eames stroked the inside of one leg, perhaps out of a need to comfort, perhaps out of a need to feel how the muscle shook and Arthur was trying to take calming breaths, but Eames twisted his tongue and Arthur was back to rocking and sobbing.   
  
Normally Eames wouldn't spend nearly this much time just licking someone out. Well, for one, normally he'd be preparing to fuck them, but even so, most of the time no one responded like they weren't sure gravity was still applicable. They didn't grip down on the sheets, feet braced on the bed and body rolling like ferocity itself.   
  
His fingers rocked slowly, at first, because there was no stretch, Arthur was  _ loose _ with pleasure, open and sucking Eames fingers in, and from there it was simplicity itself to rub against Arthur's prostate, milking it slowly, because he wanted to watch, he wanted to  _ see everything _ all at once. He inhales and everything was sweat-sharp and tinged with musk and  _ God _ , Arthur, and he rolled Arthur over, carefully, and Arthur was melted into the bedspread, arms free and open, legs splayed and staring. Just...staring.   
  
Eames fucked his tongue into Arthur's navel, rimming the dip of Arthur's stomach and Arthur got one foot on Eames shoulder and shoved him down.   
  
"Suck me." Arthur demanded.   
  
Eames pressed his fingers tighter and Arthur's body twisted, face pressed against the wrinkled once-perfection of the pillows. "I believe you said I could do anything I wanted to you."   
  
He did wrap a hand around Arthur's cock-since it looked cold-but didn't move, just smirked down at Arthur, who slipped his foot from Eames shoulder to over his back.   
  
He held Arthur steady, thrusting his fingers when he felt like it, and rolling Arthur's cock into his mouth-just the tip, let it rest in the cradle of his tongue, the soap-fresh flavor fading away at the salty taste of pre-come.Arthur tried to thrust up into his mouth, but couldn't quite seem to manage the trick of it.   
  
"Eames if you do not get me off-"   
  
"Darling, I'm really rather trying to concentrate on driving you out of your head. So you'd best relax, we might be here awhile." Eames then moved over to Arthur's hip and bit down. Arthur went tight everything, body arched and not even  _ breathing _ . Eames let go and Arthur flopped down, unsettled and eventually, after a hitch, panting.   
  
"That's it, darling."   
  
Arthur dug his nails into his own stomach, " _ Eames _ ."   
  
Eames bit his thigh, harder and Arthur did it again, just like that, practically strangling Eames's fingers and looking like he didn't understand anything else in the world. Like...cartoons. Only naked.

  
  


51

Dom had apologized, later, when he'd been slightly more himself then not.   
  
"We shouldn't have done that to you." He had said. Arthur had stared at him a moment and then went back to putting him to bed. Dom hadn't started drinking, it might have been easier if he had. Then Arthur would have had something to blame, but no. Dom had done his downward spiral all by himself. Fucked up his leg, yeah, but he wasn't going to dance without Mal anyways. But after a month of trying to get Mal to realize that everything  _ was _ real with absolutely no success, he just sort of lost the plot.   
  
Saito, the head of their sponsor company, had visited. Arthur had talked on Dom and Mal's behalf. Saito had offered his condolences, and Arthur had thanked him. Saito had kindly offered to pay for Mal's hospitalization and Arthur had thanked him.   
  
"What will you do now?" Saito had asked and Arthur hadn't known.   
  
But Dom had  _ apologized _ to him. Not about...everything...but about before that. Like he was worse off for being so wrapped up in them that he hadn't ever quite... managed anything just for himself. That his first kiss (and who cared about first kisses anymore? Seriously? People were having them in second grade these days.) had been...one...of them. They'd happened in such quick succession that he honestly didn't know. He hadn't mentioned it as much to them, because it would have just brought too much attention to what had mostly just been a quiet, comfortable moment, so he'd let it go.   
  
And clearly he hadn't had any time to go on dates what with managing them, and then, when they weren't working, being too tired to really go out and do anything so he'd just stayed in with them, and before that he hadn't really... but it hadn't been a big deal.   
  
He just didn't entirely plan on Eames. No one really planned for Eames. You  _ couldn't _ plan for a swarmy, ragamuffin British baker who wanted to wear all the things with obsession issues. No one planned for that. That was  _ never in anyone's plans _ . He hadn't planned on being the center of anyone's attention. He wasn't used to it. When he'd brought Dom in to the bakery he's honestly expected Eames to just  _ know _ to pay attention to Dom rather than Arthur, but he hadn't. When Arthur was near him Eames simply did not pay attention to anyone else. Not even Cigar, not really.   
  
But people made too much out of nothing about...going from having not had sex to having sex. It was dumb. Arthur thought it was dumb, because it wasn't...it wasn't like it was  _ actually _ the 1800's. He'd been there with Mal and Dom and he wasn't living under a rock. He knew how this shit worked. Of course his actual idea of what that transition would look like involved getting drunk and fucking some guy in a possibly semi-public place for like...ten minutes before grabbing his stuff and going. Not grabbing onto his pillow trying not to lose his structural integrity from Eames being a  _ fucking cock fuck balls piece of shit asshole _ _   
_ _   
_ "None of that made sense, darling, but don't let that stop you." Eames settled over his stomach and lowered his head far, far too slowly before settling his teeth right below his navel and Arthur jerked, and it wasn't even-he didn't know what the fuck was going on, because his chest felt too tight and his eyes wouldn't focus and the only thing, the  _ only thing in the universe _ that mattered was Eames teeth, and they stayed there, Eames just watched him and his mouth had done however many stupidly good things to him tonight, but this was what was making all the jiving, jigging, jagging parts of him smash into each other like bumper cars, or atoms, or  _ what the fuck ever _ .   
  
Eames lifted his head, and pushed the hair sticking to Arthur's forehead away from his eyes. He didn't say anything, just cupped his cheek. Arthur breathed and was happy he didn't have to figure out what to do with his hands, didn't really have to think about anything.   
  
"Suck me, already."

  
  


52

Eames was still pumping his fingers into his body and Arthur wanted Eames mouth on him, and his fingers inside him, and the ferocious feeling of victory that he was in charge of the situation. Nothing was out of control or spinning away from him. Eames smiled at him and kissed the bite red teeth marks he'd left.   
  
"It would be rude to deny you when you look like that." Eames licked his already plumped and wet lips and Arthur maybe didn't know what his life was anymore, but Eames stroked the leg still over his shoulder and sucked kisses into the length of his dick, up the vein alongside the bottom and  _ how the fuck _ did Eames make Arthur aware that parts of his cock were more sensitive than other. It was  _ his dick _ , it was supposed to just...but then Eames would catch the spot underneath the head and he didn't know which was was up anymore, because all directions were hot and wet and right in front of him. Arthur gripped the headboard and slammed his head back into the pillow.   
  
"Crying shame about the circumcision." Eames added, "Are you Jewish? Or is it just that Americans are strange. Never seen so many poor bald-headed chaps about back home." He licked a slow affectionate kiss where he'd been cut and Arthur wasn't sure how to respond. "I can ask later, when you've got your head about you, love. Mine's got a full cap, if you were wondering. As a warning."   
  
Arthur realized distantly that he never had had any control of the situation, but Eames was kind enough to let him have the delusion.   
  
"Come here darling," He murmured down to his dick, to  _ his dick _ and sucked him down, sloppy and Arthur bit down on his lower lip, but that just made everything sharper and  _ did not help _ and he managed to shove a few times with his leg by way of warning, but Eames kept his mouth sealed tight, and Arthur was gone, he was just... sizzling, saute'd, gone and never coming back again.   
  
Eames is there when he wakes up, when he  _ wakes up _ , and he know he didn't fall asleep, because going to sleep is actually somewhat of a production, but he's now woken up, and one cannot wake up without...   
  
Eames doesn't comment, just continue petting through his hair, flushes and eyes too bright. "Been awhile for you, then?" He asks after a while, with Arthur unsure of what to say or do or put his  _ fucking damn hands _ .   
  
Arthur shrugged one shoulder and Eames just smiled. "You alright? Need water or anything? I already washed you off, hope you don't mind. Seemed a waste of water to get you into the shower again."   
  
Arthur frowned, "How long-"   
  
"Fifteen minutes or so." Eames shrugged, "You've been working yourself too hard. You need anything done before you go to sleep?"   
  
"Cigar..." Arthur began and gestured to the small bed next to his bed and Eames beamed at him. Probably because he hadn't gestured so much as flopped meaningfully.   
  
"I'll tuck him in and read him a bedtime story and then let myself out. You just go to sleep."   
  
Arthur nodded and flopped back into the pillows, and just...fell asleep. Like it was easy. Like he never needed to wake up again.


	4. Chapter 4

53

Cigar was waiting outside the door alongside shoe. When the door opened he caught his shoe (and Eames did miss his shoes, really, he did, but Cigar just seemed so happy) by the back and slowly dragged it inside, before looking around the room with a look of startled, sleepy delight, then sniffing around, looking up the bed with something like despair.   
  
"He's fine, honestly, I just tuckered the poor dear out."   
  
He plucked him up and showed him Arthur. Cigar wiggled until Eames put him down on the bed, and CIgar sniffed around, crawling over Arthur's hips and shoving his nose behind Arthur's ear, then looking up at Eames like he'd done something brilliant.   
  
"Yes, you found him all by yourself." Eames whispered and Cigar crawled and sniffed, before he toddled back to Eames and peered down the side of the bed, then back up at Eames.   
  
Eames agreeably picked him up again, and Cigar peered around the room from his new, higher, vantage point.   
  
He reached and turned down the covers of Cigar bed, the quilt thick and soft in his hands. IT was a replica of Arthur's bed, and Eames had no idea where he'd gotten such a small, but fully functional mattress, but it was just just a clearly  _ Arthur _ touch to the entire idea of a dog bed. Cigar flopped down onto the mattress then stood up and whined. Eames picked up the shoe and put it alongside the bed. Cigar wagged his tail and flailed to try and get one of the laces, then tugged shoe closer and began chewing on the already well-chewed lace. He looked up at Eames and Eames pulled the quilt back over him and then rubbed his thumb over Cigar's head. He couldn't get a good scratch in, since his hand could easily smother the dachshund, but Cigar looked pleased by the attention, in any case.   
  
He looked and there was actually a picture book next to Cigar's bed. A real, actual picture book. He picked it up, carefully. It was called  _ Dog and Bear _ by Laura Vaccaro Seeger, not that either of those facts meant anything to Eames, who had been raised on horror movies and Grimms, but it had a dachshund being friends with a stuffed bear. Cigar looked at him.   
  
"You know," he said, after he finished reading the first short snippet of the book, "I read up about dachshunds. Apparently your sort isn't supposed to be friendly around strangers."   
  
Cigar's tail wagged under the quilt and Eames tickled under his chin. "But it also said your breed is very intelligent, so I can hardly blame you for liking me. I am very charming."   
  
Cigar dog-smiled at him and Eames smiled back, before giving him one last pat on the back and switching off both the lamps. He paused at the second, looking at Arthur curled up in the middle of his bed, hair wrecked and skin flushed, and looking so contented just to snuggle under his thick, white blanket that Eames had to smooth his hair down and kiss his ear. Arthur didn't move and Eames smiled.   
  
He couldn't wait for the day where he'd get to stay the night, when he'd get to curl along the delicious curve of Arthur's back, when he got to see Arthur put his dog to bed, when he got to see Arthur padding around and going through his nightly routine, before settling into Eames' arms.   
  
He tucked Arthur's arm under the covers before flicking off the lamp and letting himself out.

  
  


54

He walked home, again, debating whether it was worse to go home shoeless for the love of a small dog, or hard in your trousers for the love of a svelte brunette. His cock chafed against his pants and it was a fucking persistent erection. It was cold out, and it was a bit of a walk but his cock was entirely and completely in  _ Arthur had no pants on at all _ glee and he couldn't blame it.   
  
Arthur had been... He couldn't even think of how to describe it, and the mental attempt just drew his attention to his throbbing dick and he was glad it was winter and he could pull his coat tight otherwise his life would have been slightly awkward.   
  
His hands shook as he opened the door, shut it behind him with the weight of his body, and hoped he didn't have a surprise lock-picking visitor or burglar, because his hand was fumbling into his fly and cold hand around his hot, sore dick and it was relief and ruin all at once and he wanted Arthur to watch. He wanted Arthur to stand just  _ there _ and see what he did to Eames, witness the consequences of his actions. Arthur wouldn't even give Eames direction, wouldn't hint he enjoyed and disliked anything Eames did, he'd just let Eames run in his sandbox environment.   
  
But then, on the other hand, if he were jerking off for Arthur's entertainment, he'd have a lot more slick, and wouldn't be slouching in his doorway. He'd be in a bed, with good lighting and slick fucking  _ everywhere _ . Arthur would spill it and everything would be too slippery and Arthur would fall into another one of those lovely laughing fits and they'd slide everywhere and not be able to grab onto anything, and Arthur would  _ just keep laughing _ .   
  
Eames couldn't even get out of his coat, barely got a thrust in, before he was coming over his hand, going harder then he had any right to, just needing and needing and that's all he did around Arthur anymore, just fucking  _ need everything _ and accepting  _ anything _ and he slumped against the door, not even caring his dick was softening, cradled in his hand and hanging out of his clothing like he was some sort of renegade pervert.   
  
He panted into the dark of his apartment, holding his trousers up as he went to his room, stripped down fully and tossed everything into the hamper and then flopped down onto his mattress, tugging his blankets up around him and smashing his face into his pillow-exhausted and wired and just wanting to tuck Arthur in next to him and inhale him all night, wake up with lungs full of him and spend the rest of the day trying not to breathe too much in case that shook the build-up loose.   
  
"You're sort a romantic sop." He informed himself, "And a bit disturbing."   
  
He stuck a tongue out in retort and rolled over, stretching in an arch and grabbed his spare pillow, wrapping his arm around it and smashing his face into it's fluffy contours. He just needed to be patient and eventually he could have what he wanted. He could have Arthur waking up all rumbled and happy, scratching his stomach and giving Eames a kiss somewhere good morning, before padding out to have one of Eames bagels and making them both coffee as Eames snuck to Arthur's side of the bed to sink into his heat, just for that luxurious few moments before he  _ had _ to get up. He'd get it eventually.   
  
Later he'd grab his mobile and click a picture of himself and send it to Arthur with the text of  _ wot U mssd ths mrning _ _   
_ _   
_ And Arthur would send something back like,  _ Surely, I shall pine forever for this lost opportunity _ or "You have drool on your chin." or whatever with however many vowels and whatnot, and Eames would demand a picture back, and he wouldn't get one, but at least he knew what Arthur looked like when he went to bed, all debauched and content.   
  
But that was four hours away and right now he had to renew his very important, loving and supportive relationship with his beloved mattress.

  
  


55

Eames spent his entire day in a happy, tired haze, unsure of what he was making, or who he was talking to, or what was going on, other then he had gotten to do a bare fraction of all the beautifully wretched things he wanted to Arthur's body, and the sample had only served to make him hungrier. Ariadne probably had tried to talk to him, but he had simply beamed at her, and comment on how stupidly splendid everything in the  _ entire world _ was.   
  
"Stop smiling, you look demented." Ariadne said somewhere around two pm. "Seriously, there are too many knives in here for you to smile like that."   
  
"It's just such a beautiful day, isn't it?" He beamed at the sky, and then at her, and then at the counter and then at the nice old lady buying herself a slice of black forest torte. "Isn't today just lovely?"   
  
The old lady nodded slowly, had an awkward smile with him, then scooted away with her cake Eames kept smiling at her as she settled down in one of the comfy chairs next to the fire with a fork and a glass of milk. Eames smiled at the sugar and cinnamon doughnuts he was frying, he smiled at the chocolate covered strawberry pie he was making-brushing bittersweet chocolate inside the chocolate cookie crust shell- he smiled at the lights and the windows and the floors and the sausage rolls and his rolling pins.   
  
Oh his rolling pins. They were so delightful. They rolled and he patted them on their wee handles.   
  
Ariadne stole one of the chocolate chip cookies off the full sheet. Say what you would about souffles and tarts, but you couldn't beat a classic. Especially not when they were still warm and soft the chocolate melting as the cookie tore apart, steam rising fresh and the whole thing melting apart in your mouth. Ariadne could eat roughly an entire pan by herself, and she tended to eat at least two or three.   
  
She hopped up on the counter and bit in, savoring the flavor briefly, before licking the chocolate off the corner of her mouth and rubbed her chin thoughtfully. "So third date went well?"   
  
Eames beamed at her like he was looking for criminals with his teeth. Ariadne smiled back then flicked his nose. "I don't think anyone in the world has looked happier than you have about getting into someone's pants."   
  
"He has such lovely trousers though, doesn't he?" Eames grabbed a cookie for himself and dunked it in Ariadne's milk and munched it consideringly. "If there are any trousers more lovely I wouldn't even know what to do with myself. I don't think it's actually possible. Do you?" He sighed and munched gleefully. "He's just so..." He hummed.   
  
Ariadne shoved his arm and got down to clean up front of house a bit. "Move along, Sunshine Billy, some of us need to work."   
  
"I think I shall make all the pies." Eames decided. "All the pies."   
  
"I'd say you were cute, if you weren't so pathetic." Ariadne said, sweeping up the floor.

  
  


56

Eames did not exactly wait until Thursday. He was bad at waiting, and if he could have taken Arthur on a date on Friday he  _ would _ have. As it was, he knew his bakery closed early on Saturdays, as did Arthur's bistro, and thus he had a Plot. Most amusement parks were closed this far into November, but there were still a few indoor parks they could go to. Not with Cigar, unfortunately, his Plot to get Cigar onto a Ferris Wheel would have to wait until next season, but it was a plan for the future.   
  
But that was Saturday, and today was Friday, and the cruel, cruel world had decided he needed to  _ work _ for his money and thus he couldn't simply sweep Arthur off his feet and ravish him. Or be ravished. He was still entirely on board with any direction the ravishing decided to take.   
  
He called Arthur during his lunch break and Arthur chewed and listened as Eames talked. He was generally quite good at that, and Eames continued on his Holy Quest to get Arthur to laugh. He wanted Arthur to laugh again. It was basically his shiny new addiction since he'd gotten rid of all the other ones, and when it was Eames' lunch break, he went to Arthur's bistro and Arthur looked up and smiled.   
  
That was probably his favorite part. He loved the food, sure. Of course he did. How could he not love the food? Yusuf had a taste for the sort of food that could knock you off your feet, and then settle you back into a comfortable haven of familiarity. But Arthur smiling at him? Better than any French Onion soup on the planet. He would come in and Arthur would see him, and smile, something honest and small just for Eames, something Eames had  _ earned _ , and that was better, even, then getting to finally see how Arthur looked completely sopping and wrecked. If Arthur just wanted to hold hands and smile at him for the rest of time, Eames would gleefully die of sexual frustration for him.   
  
He, of course, didn't say any of that out loud, because he just wanted Arthur to keep smiling at him and not get self conscious about it. When Eames came, Arthur always had food ready for him, a sandwich, some soup and a salad. They changed from day to day, but he never asked Eames what he preferred and it was still always  _ fucking delicious _ .   
  
"Next time you should pack it in a lunch box with a little note," Eames said peering into the paper bag. The special of the day was strips of house-grilled chicken with melted, aged Gruyére, perfectly sauteed mushrooms and ripe roma tomatoes between hefty slices of ciabatta bread. "Oh that smells lovely. Do you suppose Ariadne would be overly upset if I ate hers too?"   
  
Arthur looked around the shop, which was empty for the moment, grabbed him around the neck and dragged him in for a kiss over the counter. It was over before he could even register what was happening and Arthur was straightening his vest and his hat and Eames had the weirdest desire to lick his bracers. Not even the skin under his bracers. Not even Arthur  _ naked _ except for bracers. He just wanted to lean over and shamelessly lick them. He was however, beginning to get used to these perplexing urges Arthur engendered and so he squashed that one to be fulfilled at a later time.   
  
"You should feel free to do that anytime you feel like it." Eames blinked as Arthur attempted to compose himself, fixing his collar and cuffs like he hadn't just engaged in a truly delightful bout of public affection. Eames wondered if he could, in the future, get Arthur into a darkened club somewhere, pull Arthur down onto his lap and just kiss him like there was no one else in the entire world. Arthur probably hated clubs-- too loud or smelly or some such nonsense. He just wanted to be able to drag Arthur down and kiss him, to be able to curl up around him on a bus, to drag him into the lake during summer with all his clothes on... or off depending on the time of day.   
  
Mostly he wanted Arthur to smile all the time.   
  
"The soup is [ Portabella](http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/15305/portobello-mushroom-soup.html) , and the salad is something you will eat regardless of what it contains. Which is, for the record, lots of spinach."

  
  


57

Eames pouted at him. "Do I get dessert if I eat all my veggies?"   
  
"You're the one who works in a bakery," Arthur retorted, dry as sherry, and Eames' head was still zinging and ringing and generally singing in the most cacophonous of delights and he wanted to lift Arthur's shirt and blow a raspberry into his belly, and grab his hand and never, ever stop running just because.   
  
Eames lifted Arthur's hand and pressed a kiss to his knuckles, opening his lips and letting his tongue slip between the ridges of Arthur's bones and Arthur's hand clenched, but he didn't pull back. He pulled back after a moment to ask, "Is Yusuf in?"   
  
Arthur resolutely stopped the shiver that was trying to run down his spine. “Would you mind not slobbering all over me? I have a dog for that. And yes, he'll likely make you de-vein shrimp if you go back there."   
  
Eames scrunched his nose, "I do detest seafood, but I need to ask him some very important questions. Nay, vital. Vital questions."   
  
"He doesn't know my favorite color, song, food or flower either, Eames. You could just ask me, you know."   
  
"But you'd be so distressingly practical about your favorite color! That, or you'd deflect by making fun of what I'm wearing."   
  
"That would be because when you were little you decided your life goal was to be a Crayola Box when you grew up, but you chose the limited fluorescent edition whereas I woke up one day and decided to have a sense of taste and some human dignity."   
  
Eames mumbled something that could have been a very pouty “Well fine then..." if he did that sort of thing. Which he didn't. He  _ was _ considering going back to his Macaroni Noodles of Woe, but he was  _ certainly _ not pouting. His overwhelming sense of joy quickly won out however and he looked up and grinned, "Yusuf looks like a smart chap, he had to have picked something up about you in all this time.”   
  
Eames got up and brushed against Arthur on his way to the kitchen. Arthur scowled and pretended to ignore him, but the overall effect was ruined by his absent minded rubbing of where Eames had so effectively made love to his knuckles.   
  
Eames walked into the back and grinned at Yusuf. "You know what you have to do to get any information for me." Yusuf nodded to the giant bowl full of just-thawed shrimp and Eames washed his hands, tugged on gloves and began peeling the shrimp from their plastic-y shells. They were slimy and limp in his hands, but he ripped them free with an old and practiced hatred.   
  
"If you want him a day that isn't Thursday it isn't happening." Yusuf said, "Business goes down 40% on his day off."   
  
"Does he like roller coasters?" Eames asked dropping another curl of shrimp into the large metal bowl. Yusuf plucked another shrimp out and cut a line down its back before taking out the line sticky line of its vein and wiping it onto a paper towel, before dropping it into another bowl.   
  
"He's never been." Yusuf said, "Which I only know because he said as much to a customer around State Fair season. Though, if you ask me--which you have-- if it's an activity one does from the ages of five to eighteen, then Arthur probably hasn't done it, and no, I don't know why and even if I did, it wouldn't be my place to say."   
  
Eames frowned, the two of them working in silence. He could hear Arthur outside, talking to a customer and he decided that he was going to take him on  **all** the roller coaster rides and merry-go-rounds and then feed him junk food until Arthur was overstimulated and tired like Cigar after a visit to a shoe store. If Arthur ended up liking amusement parks even a  _ fraction _ as much as he liked cartoons, Eames would take him to every park that there ever was  _ ever. _ _   
_ _   
_ "I thought you had a prep cook for things like this."   
  
"Ah, but she is the one who runs the counters on Arthur's day off, so today is  _ her _ day off so  _ I _ need to do everything extra. I used to run front, but then it got unreasonable."   
  
Eames kept thinking for another few moments, working swiftly, and Yusuf watched him patiently, waiting for the next inevitable question and appreciating the free help. "You didn't actually need to get rid of Cigar, did you? You just decided Arthur needed a dog. Quite correctly, obviously."

  
  


58

Yusuf peered meaningfully at Eames.   
  
"Thought so." Eames nodded and smiled. Obviously Arthur's friends (not to mention elderly neighbors, and customers and complete strangers) wanted Arthur to be happy just as much as he did. He was also quite tickled over the idea of Yusuf plotting to give Arthur a dog too adorable to give up. He peeled off his gloves. "Have a good day Chef, and thanks for the info."   
  
Yusuf nodded and didn't threaten him, which Eames took as a sign that they would soon be fast friends. Eames grabbed his paper bag full of deliciousness and headed back to work.

\---

  
  
Actually, he entirely failed at waiting until Thursday. He managed to hold out all the way until Saturday evening and considered himself quite heroic for the effort.   
  
"I brought you flowers and bagels." Eames held up the bouquet of lilies with an unabashed smile and a bag of bagels. "They're rosemary and garlic. You haven't tried them, but you'll like them. Unless you actually  _ are _ a cyborg from the future who can only live off sun-dried tomatoes."   
  
Arthur blinked at Eames, which Eames chose to interpret as intense approval of his actions, because clearly he was wooing Arthur through the power of his verbal magnificence. Or, perhaps it was the flowers. No, scratch that. It had to be his magnificence.   
  
Toothbrush still in his mouth, towel slung around his neck, and dressed only in his boxers,  Arthur walked back to the bathroom, spat, and called out, "Did you have to knock like something was  _ on fire _ ?"   
  
"The result I was aiming for was achieved." Eames grinned salaciously, thinking of rumpled, off-guard Arthur who had looked through his peep hole and opened the door without pulling on so much as a robe. "I'll just put these in a vase then yes? You  _ would _ tell me if you were deathly allergic to flowers, right? I am prone to random gift giving of potentially lethal things you know..." He nosed around in Arthur's kitchen and located a long, beautiful crystal vase in a cupboard.   
  
"I don't know if you have a favorite flower, but I thought the lilies were elegant. You like elegant things. Oh hello there. I see you have a rope."   
  
Cigar wagged his tail, hefting the end of a thick piece of rope and Eames grabbed the other end. It wasn't so much tug-of-war as it was tug-and-drag-Cigar-about-the-house. Cigar seemed to enjoy being dragged around the kitchen tiles and Eames enjoyed dragging him, as Cigar growled and tried to dig in his back paws and generally failed to get a good grip on anything.   
  
"You realize that this is, in fact, Saturday, yes?" Arthur asked coming back out with a shirt on, which was a shame, really. He had no need to get dressed on account of Eames. "Not Thursday?"   
  
"Ah, but I arrived as soon as I knew you'd be home, and you don't need to be at the Bistro until 11 AM tomorrow, so we should go out on a date."   
  
"A date?"   
  
"Yes." Eames continued his tug-and-drag with Cigar while looking up at Arthur in his well-fitting t-shirt and boxer briefs. He tried to not stare overtly at the long line of pale legs, or the way the shirt clung to his shoulders, and well, he sort of failed, because Arthur's knees were  _ right there _ .   
  
"And where would this hypothetical date take us?" Arthur let the towel drape back over his neck, and he fidgeted with the flower arrangements. "I don't have a sitter for Cigar, and he doesn't like being alone at night."   
  
"He could come along." Eames improvised. He could combine his Plans. His Plans could become One Singular Plan. "I'll try to behave so as not to corrupt his young, innocent mind."   
  
Eames plucked up Cigar and held him up for Arthur to see. "Look at him. He wants to be a dog about town. He wants to howl at the moon and look at the ladies. You have to facilitate his growth."   
  
Arthur re-claimed his dog and Cigar promptly began chewing on his towel. "I think he was actually looking forward to a night in."   
  
"But it's a full moon. He needs to give into his primal wiener dog urges. You cannot deny him, he might go mad."   
  
"One, it is,  _ maybe _ a 3/4 moon, and two, wiener dogs aren't werewolves." He reached down and grabbed Cigar's rope. Cigar settled in and went back to gnawing on that instead of Arthur's thick and fluffy towel.

  
  


59

"Not a werewolf, no, but he has beast-like urges that need to be appeased. Look at him tearing at his rope. This is clearly a sign of deep physiological turmoil." Eames tugged on the other end of the rope. "We'll go out together, two men and an impossibly small dog. It will be worthy of our own heartwarming feature film."   
  
Arthur snorted. "I'll just go get dressed then."   
  
"It is a bit chilly." Eames agreed taking Cigar from him and continued tugging the rope. Cigar didn't have a big enough mouth to get a good grip on anything, or enough brawn to keep any grip he got, but he was persistent in snapping up the scraggly ends of his brightly colored toy. Except when he decided that the buttons on Eames’ shirt where much more fascinating, flopping onto his stomach and nosed around, pressing his muzzle to the thin cotton of his undershirt in the gap between buttons.   
  
"Sorry darling, as cute as you are, you are not the member of this household I want investigating around there, up we get." He put Cigar on the floor and Cigar nosed around, before running and tackling a stuffed rabbit tucked away inside a shoe. Not  _ his _ shoe, Eames had yet to see Cigar's shoe, but  _ a _ shoe containing a stuffed squeaky rabbit nonetheless. He pulled out his camera for a future Ariadne bribe as Cigar waged war upon the squeaky helpless inhabitant of Castle Von Sneaker.   
  
"Where are we going, exactly?"   
  
"Wear something warm." Eames replied, "It's outside."   
  
"What is it with you and the outdoors?" Arthur asked, "You would be taking me camping if it were warm outside, wouldn't you?"   
  
"And conveniently forgetting a sleeping bag, no less." Eames added, "We'd roast marshmellows and Cigar will eat a hot dog and we'll laugh and laugh and the studio audience will laugh because they're told, I'll say one of my catch phrases, Cigar will do something even more precious than usual, then we'll have a commercial break."   
  
Arthur leaned out of the doorway to frown at Eames, and Eames tried a winning smile.   
  
"I refuse to live in a sitcom. I hate sitcoms."   
  
"You can't hate sitcoms. No one honestly hates sitcoms. It's like hating pop music. You may objectively find it distasteful, but just you wait, you'll be humming it in the shower soon enough."   
  
"Do you identify with the pop song, Eames?" Arthur went back into his room, the sound of drawers being opened.   
  
"Well, I promise I am completely sincere," Eames said as Cigar finally wrestled the rabbit out of the shoe and bashed the fluffy bastard against the ground without mercy or quarter. Once Cigar deemed the rabbit sufficiently dead enough, he trotted towards Arthur's bedroom. "And I don't have a lesson at the end or anything."   
  
Arthur came out in a thick jumper, a fuzzy scarf wrapped around his neck, tugging on his coat and pulling out a pair of gloves and a hat. They matched the scarf. Of course they matched the scarf. Arthur went and picked up Cigar and took off his indoor collar, and wrapped his shiny outdoor collar on.   
  
"Does he need a sweater?"   
  
"Does he have a sweater?" Eames asked, because he didn't care if they were going to the center of a volcano, he wanted to see Cigar in a sweater. He was generally against small dogs in outfits, but if it was for the sake of keeping his wee self warm, then Eames was all about the tiny sweaters.   
  
Arthur squinted at him briefly, before handing Cigar to Eames and going back in the room for a sweater and a carrier bag. The sweater did  _ not _ match anything, which made it roughly six billion times better, in Eames opinion. Cigar sniffed his sweater then looked up at Arthur as Arthur put Cigar's shoe on the ground, waited for Cigar to stuff himself in, then placed all of them into the bag.   
  
"Stop staring at me like that," Arthur said after Eames continued to stare at him like that for an extended period of time. Arthur shifted uncomfortably then held the bag closer. "Where are we going."   
  
"We have to make a stop first, and then we're going to right a terrible wrong in this world."   
  
Eames snatched up Arthur's hand gleefully and tugged him out the door. "Trust me, you'll love this."   
  
Arthur flicked the lights off and locked the door behind him with a click.

  
  


60

He had to bribe Ariadne with the video of Cigar's successful conquering raid of Castle Von Sneaker. He would have shown her Cigar, but then they would have  _ never gotten around to doing anything _ . Which was, of course, completely understandable. If it weren't for the very real and vital draw of Arthur, Eames wouldn't get anything done either. But as was, he got nothing done because he was too busy thinking about Arthur's trousers.   
  
But he did, eventually, get her car. He opened the door for Arthur, sweeping him into the passenger seat before settling down on the driver's side.   
  
It was about a hour and a half drive to the only outdoor amusement park still open this late in the season. Ariadne had utterly crap CD's, but Arthur had an mp3 player plug in, thing-Eames didn't have much knowledge of technology, but he liked that they suddenly had Django Reinhardt rustling through the speakers. Cigar wiggled his head out of the gap Arthur had made for him, saw they were in a car, and immediately stuffed himself back in the bag.   
  
Arthur was relaxed in the seat, bag on his lap as the heater blew dry air around them.   
  
"So, what were you going to do tonight?" Eames asked as they settled in for the drive.   
  
Arthur shrugged, "Just have a night in, go to bed early."   
  
"And what does a night in with Arthur look like, these days?" Eames drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. "A box of wine and a bit of Fitzgerald? A curl up on the sofa and a fluffy blanket?"   
  
Arthur huffed. "I don't read Fitzgerald in my free time. Or Lovecraft, before you ask."   
  
Eames hummed. "Never liked horror, myself."   
  
Arthur was quiet for a bit, then shrugged, "Cartoons. I was going to watch cartoons.  _ Freakazoid _ and then eat pickles."   
  
Eames grinned, "You like pickles?"   
  
Arthur shifted and looked out the window. "Yeah."   
  
Eames grinned.   
  
"What are you so happy about?"   
  
"I like knowing about things you like. You like cartoons, and small dogs, and sundried tomatoes, and bagels, and steampunk things, and clockwork, and ballroom dancing, 40's music, things that match, and well-tailored trousers, getting your arse eaten out, getting bitten, and snogging on the couch, and biting me bruised, ridiculously soft sweaters, crosswords, and Scotch, and running things on schedule, and pickles." Eames rubbed his thumbs over the cool plastic and rubber of the wheel.   
  
Arthur paused. "I like Let's Plays too."   
  
"What?"   
  
"Let's Plays. People post videos of them playing video or computer games with commentary. I like the old ones, for DOS games or N64." Arthur squirreled his hand inside his bag to fuddle around with Cigar. Eames glanced at him, but that seemed all Arthur wanted to say about it. So Eames brought up a safely neutral topic of discussion-food-and Arthur relaxed into the seat and Eames pocketed another little glimmer of Arthur away in his pocket and focused on where he was going.

  
  


61

There was barely anyone at all in the park when they got there. It was three hours until closing, admission was half-off because it was the last weekend they were open, and no one investigated Arthur's bag for small, excitable dogs.   
  
Arthur looked around as Eames kept a firm hold of his hand. In case carnies decided they wanted to steal Arthur away and make him one of their own.   
  
"I'm not going to get lost." Arthur said, noting Eames's hand. "Or wander off."   
  
"What do you want to go on first?" Eames asked. Near the entrance was a balloon stall and an information Kiosk, a few people mulling around peering at maps and the like. Eames picked up a map and looked about. There were six big roller coasters-a wooden one called Ol' Crickety, two steel ones working in tandem called Tweedledee and Tweedledum, a flying steel roller coaster entitled Batman, a twister steel roller coaster fittingly called The Twist, and the crown jewel, built this year, a massive, mostly underground mine roller coaster simply deemed "The Nightmare."   
  
"The Ferris wheel," Arthur stated, firmly. Eames looked, and there was a Ferris wheel next to Ol' Crickety. It apparently wasn't cool enough to warrant a name, but Eames delighted in trailing down the winding paths, looking at the statues, placed alongside the bare branches of various trees, and the dead and empty stone-lined flowerbeds. They passed through a little food court, with cotton candy, candy apples, burgers, fries, exotic sea food and the like all crowded around a blockish path of benches and bins.   
  
Arthur’s bag rustled as they passed by the smell of cooking meat and Arthur held Cigar too him a bit more closely.   
  
There was hardly a line at all, and the ticketeer just ripped their stubs and they were settled into a small, covered car with a single hard bench and large windows to peer out of. The seatbelts with pathetic little nylon things that weren't going to do anyone a bit of good unless the car decided to fly to the moon. Arthur clutched Cigar's bag to him until the door closed and the car gently rose a bit before the car stopped again. They were out of sight from the official types, and Arthur quickly took Cigar out of the bag and settled the tiny dog to look out the window. Cigar, far from being frightened, shoved his muzzle against the cold window and his tail whipped back and forth as he looked around about how high he was.   
  
"He just wants to be taller than life, doesn't he?"   
  
"He likes being high." Arthur turned to Eames, "but you knew that already."   
  
Eames settled in and looked out as the car slowly clunked upwards again. Arthur rubbed his knuckles against Cigar's stomach and then looked at Eames.   
  
"I already knew you were going to take me to an amusement park, you know. Yusuf said you asked."   
  
"Mmm." Eames agreed. He could see a Graviton from here. They had to probably avoid any ride Arthur wouldn't be able to take his Cigar bag on, but there was a merry-go-round yonder, and Eames did like carousels. Or maybe the ghost train. They could come back in the spring and go on the rides they couldn't sneak Cigar onto, take Arthur on every single coaster, and every thrill ride and water slide and log flume. But Arthur seemed entirely pleased about where they were, slowly clunking up the wheel and seeing more and more of the park stretching outwards, the curves and dipes of the coasters, the twisting in and out turns of the go-karts at the bottom of Ol' Crrickety. He wanted to race Arthur and bet lunch. They could go through the Haunted House and Arthur would be pointedly unimpressed, or down the water rapids and get complete soaked and Arthur would be grumpy and later Eames could soak behind him in a hot bath-Eames' tub, Arthur's tub was a spit of a thing. Eames’ tub was reasonably sized, and he wanted to know if he could tire him out and take care of him. Or if maybe Arthur just never got worn down at all.

  
  


62

Right now he had a delighted look in his eyes and that was reward enough, really, though that was another for the list of Things Eames Didn't Say Outloud. Arthur slipped his hand under Eames' and Eames tucked his fingers in around Arthur's gloved hand.   
  
"So did your plan go as far as getting Cigar on a Ferris Wheel?"   
  
"Basically." Eames agreed. "Also that we can go on rides. I figured anything that involves fulfilling one of Cigar's lifelong dreams and involves me in a theme park is a good plan." Eames lifted his hands like scales, and slowly lowered one, "Company of a lovely man, his lovely dog, seeing his dog on a Ferris Wheel spazzing out because he's tall, and roller coaster." The lowering hand hit the bottom of the car. Arthur snorted at him.   
  
  
"Do you ever get tired of just..." Arthur trailed off and looked at Cigar trying to shove his face through the window, shaking in either cold or excitement, paws against the glass, kneading at the trains on coasters. Cigar didn't bark. Eames had never actually heard Cigar bark properly. He wuffed, and he whined and he whimpered, but he never actually, properly barked.   
  
"Does he bark?"   
  
"No. Never has." Arthur rubbed his thumb under Cigar's jaw. "Don't know why."   
  
Arthur leaned against Eames and didn't say anything, but Eames tucked his arm around him and instead of his normal habit of mostly viewing Eames cuddling attempts like one would view sitting in a particularly weirdly shaped chair, but this time he cuddled in and then scowled up at Eames. Eames deliberately looked out the window and Arthur huffed. They were about a quarter of the way around, swinging in the breeze, and the view out his window had the scenery, while the view out Arthur's mostly had the coaster cars speeding past.   
  
"So after this do you want to go on the bumper cars? Or maybe the Scrambled Eggs or Pirate Ship?"   
  
Arthur looked out Eames' window and then took the map from Eames and looked it over, then pulled out a pen and began marking stars and circling the numerical map.   
  
"Are you making a plan?"   
  
"We'll do the merry-go-round after we do the observational tower, and in between we can see the last showing at the circus which is between the two, and the merry-go-round should take long enough that we can bide our time until the last showing at the 3D cinema, with a 10 minute grace period." He began muttering to himself and writing in the margins of the map. Arthur was making battle plans for the park, looking up what the ride times were and what they consisted of and if they would scare his dog.   
  
He tucked the pen under his teeth and read, then checked the map, before checking the quickest path between two attractions, or if there was anything worth looking at between two points. Eames, personally, was the wandering around, do as it did type, leaving when he got bored. Arthur curled up next to Eames, Cigar having moved to Eames lap when Arthur got the map-pen relationship rolling. Eames cupped Cigar's body in his free hand and Cigar looked at him and dog-smiled at him.   
  
Eames looked down, they were near the top, and it wasn't nearly high enough to see everywhere, but he had a good view of some paths and the few people mulling about, taking pictures and drinking cocoa.   
  
"If you want to go on a roller coaster," He said, "I can hold Cigar while you go."   
  
"I'm fine." Eames stretched out as much as he could in the small car. "Are we going on the model train tour?"   
  
"Closed for the season, but we are taking the monorail from the crooked house to the-" Arthur was muffled, because Eames needed to kiss him, and unfortunately the rest of the sentence was collateral damage. Arthur poked him in the belly with his pen. "What? Basic theme park rides get you hot? The sight of plastic and the sound of barely working machinery get your motor going?"   
  
"Thank you. Your faith in the deviance my sexual appetite is, as always, appreciated."   
  
Arthur turned back to his map with a smirk and went to check what the Snaker consisted of.

  
  


63

One of these days, despite the bad economy and the fact that Eames didn't actually  _ own _ a car, he wanted to get lost somewhere with Arthur. Of course Arthur would be true to form and not find it romantic and rather spend all the time trying to get them  _ un _ -lost, so maybe what he actually wanted to do was be in one of those movies, those movies with a long coil of road and no roof, balmy desert air blowing past, and Arthur stretched out in the passenger seat with a thin cotton undershirt-or, hell, no shirt even (it was Eames' head: no shirt, no shoes, no...clever...ending to that.), blue jeans and no socks or shoes, just him smiling at Eames, controlling the radio, both of them going absolutely nowhere.   
  
But, as he followed Arthur's carefully detailed plan, he realized that while it was possible Arthur would go on a road trip with him, but he'd be dressed sensibly and looking at a map, Cigar in a dog carrier in his lap and then very pointedly going  _ somewhere _ , but Eames would enjoy that too.   
  
He enjoyed it enough driving back, Arthur blinking sleepily in the passenger seat, and pretending he wasn't sleepy. Arthur had been entirely too delighted by all the rides that Eames hadn't been on since he was a wee technicolor chappie with a full schoolbag and a song in his heart. Or a packet of fags and a scowl on his face. One of those was correct.   
  
"Next time we'll go on all the roller coasters." Eames promised.   
  
Arthur blinked at him, snuggling into the warmth of the car. "Doesn't it not open until May?"   
  
Eames nodded, "No good having a park open in the winter, is it?"   
  
"So you think we'll still be going out then?"   
  
"Are we going out now?" Eames thought they were. As here they were. Together. And out.   
  
"Well what do you want to call it?"   
  
"I'd quite like to be your boyfriend, it has a sense of security only a title can give you. And then I would be neatly organized, and Cigar can stop being in this horrid transient state of affection. He needs stability in his life."   
  
"Stop using my dog against me."   
  
"I will  _ never stop doing that _ , and it isn't against you, really. I want to be your boyfriend, and I'm rather amazing. A catch, one might say."   
  
"There's something in there with catch and colds, but I'm too tired to think of it right now." Arthur rested against the window. "I'll think about it."   
  
Eames smiled to himself and Arthur was asleep by the time they got back, curled up and head pillowed on Eames' coat, Cigar flopped an exhausted in his bag from dashing back and forth to see all the windows in the empty Observational Tower. It was a dark drive back, music on low, the highway blazed out in front of them, and Eames wouldn't have minded driving for awhile, just him and Arthur and Arthur's impossibly small dog. He had nowhere to go and if he didn't show up to work Ariadne would kill him and use his life insurance to pay off the small business loan and then own his bakery, and that just  _ would not do _ .   
  
Still, it was a nice dream.   
  
They pulled up and parked the car back at Ariadne's, and Arthur yawned and Eames took Cigar and wrapped his long, swoopy, super hero detective coat from SPACE about Arthur and Arthur yawned again.   
  
"Sorry, been a day."   
  
"We'll get you home."   
  
Arthur paused. "Your house is closer."   
  
"What about Cigar's extremely wee bed?"   
  
"He can sleep on a pillow. He does it during thunderstorms." Arthur coughed and then shifted uncomfortably.   
  
"In that case, I would be delighted to have you in my home." Eames really would. He would love few things more then Arthur in his bed, even if he was just going to sleep as Arthur obviously fit for. Arthur leaned on him as Eames opened his door. They let Cigar out, and he toddled about in a haze of sleepy puppy confusion before whining and flopping over Arthur's shoe in tired flump. Arthur didn't look much better to be honest.   
  
He got Arthur into one of his t-shirts and Arthur's boxer-which was a horrific temptation in and of itself, but Arthur blinked and Eames restricted himself to light groping.

  
  


64

"Hey, hey come here." Arthur said, hair tousled to hell, body draped in the thick cotton of one of Eames favorite sleep shirts, legs long and pale and his arms came up to drag Eames down on top of him. Eames went slowly, placed a knee on the bedspread and settled his hand on Arthur's hip. Arthur's legs rose up and he placed his feet flat on the bedspread and Eames lost track of his breathing. It just fucked off and left him with these lungs he was supposed to know what to know what to do with. Stupid breathing, with its vicious, horrific betrayal. He was going to have to speak to the management about that.   
  
"Want me to read you a bedtime story?" Eames asked, rubbing his thumb along the line of Arthur's belly. "Perhaps get you a glass of warm milk?"   
  
Arthur blinked at him languidly and rubbed the scrub of Eames stubbed, feeling it agaisnt his fingers, tracing the line of his jaw. "You didn't ask me your question."   
  
"You were having fun," Eames said, tilting his head against Arthur's fingers, and Arthur rubbed his knuckles under Eames' chin, at the soft give of his throat.   
  
"Ask me now," Arthur said, even though Eames was squeezed between his thighs and he was petting Eames' throat he still looked like he expected a coherent answer.   
  
Eames indulged in the petting another moment, then he switched hands and pressed his fingers under Arthur's side and rubbed against the scar. Arthur paused, but then went back to absorbing the texture of Eames unshaved face.   
  
"Are they why you never dated? the good Mr and Mrs. Cobb, I mean." He asked, because the question had stayed there, eating at his brain, like thought termites. Which was a thought almost unsexy enough to calm Eames down, but then his mental Arthur skipped in wearing only one of Eames' shirts and the buss kill was dutifully killed. None could stand against Eames' sexy defense.   
  
"Not...I was busy."   
  
"With them?" Eames asked and Arthur wiggled uncomfortably, so Eames got off and settled down near him. Arthur sat up and then didn't seem to know what to do with himself.   
  
"I don't know what you're implying." He replied, stiffly.   
  
"Has anyone ever been just for you, is what I mean to get at." Eames watched as Arthur's shoulders squared and his jaw clenched together so tightly that Eames saw a muscle jump. "So you did love them."   
  
Arthur got up and glared at him. "I said you had  _ one _ question, Eames."   
  
Eames considered this and scooted forward and looked up at Arthur, "Have you ever let yourself be selfish, then. That's my question. Have you just grabbed on to somewhere and declared them yours and decided that no one else could have them. Have you ever let yourself do that?"   
  
Arthur stared down at him, then turned to look at Cigar, and kept his voice low. "I have been selfish  _ plenty _ of times, Chef Eames, and..." He seemed to not know what to say, so he dug a hand through his hair. "Really your ego is-Do you think you're just going to-"   
  
"Arthur." Eames interrupted. "I'm not saying I'm going to sweep you off your feet and make all your dreams come true."

  
  


65

Arthur turned to his clothing, but didn't move towards it. They sort of hung there a moment, not doing anything and then Arthur made up his mind and let out a sigh of, "Not...conventionally, no. I haven't had...but that's not to say I haven't had  _ anyone _ ." Arthur fingers twitched at his sides.   
  
"But not-"   
  
"No. Not just for me. Happy?"   
  
"Not even slightly." Eames replied and took Arthur's hand which stayed limp in his grasp, but not tugged out of it, either. "I don't ask to be cruel, darling, I just want to understand." He rubbed his thumb against Arthur's wrist. "Like you said, you were busy. Lamentable as that is, I'm hardly going to judge you for it. I just wanted to know."   
  
Arthur was tense and brittle and was still not looking at him and Eames clearly missed something blundering about as he had. But he didn't regret it, he just needed to find his way out.   
  
"You deserve something for yourself."   
  
Arthur looked at him, then sighed, some tension leaking out, but then nodding to the bed. "Let's just...sleep."   
  
Eames kissed his knuckles. "Going to bed upset is bad for your digestion. And I would be a wretched host if I let you go to bed angry at me. You might kill me in your sleep and that's no way to start off your day. You'd need to clean up the body and then go to work and Cigar. Think of Cigar."   
  
"I'm not upset."   
  
"You're scowling a lot for such a carefree and chipper man." Eames tugged him down.   
  
"Come on, love, I can't help being curious. You can't blame me wanting to know more. I don't want to poke at sores and old wounds, but I can't help flailing around like a madman when I'm clutching at every spare scrap of info I can get. It's not like I can waltz into your mind and grab all of your secrets."   
  
Arthur huffed, then rubbed his face. "We've been...it's been less than two months. I said you could ask a question, and you did, and I answered it. There's nothing to be angry about. I'm not angry. I'm just...tired." He finished and looked at the bed with such a degree of lounging that Eames had to believe him.   
  
"Well, you need to make children ice cream in your impossible steampunk ice cream maker, so we need you well-rested. Come on." He tugged the blankets down and snuggled in under them, covers not nearly as thick or heavy as Arthur's because Eames tended to run hot.   
  
Arthur crawled in next to him and sneaked a kiss to Cigar's head like Eames maybe wouldn't be able to see in the dark and Ha!  _ not likely _ . After a moment he settled in closer to Eames, perhaps to try and convince Eames that he wasn't mad, perhaps because he honestly wasn't and put a hand next to Cigar like he need reassurance that they were both still there.   
  
"Goodnight darling." Eames said, nuzzling into Arthur's neck, and they weren't quite spooning, Arthur's legs being curls up to his stomach, and Eames liking his stretched out, but Arthur's back was tight to his chest and he could smell the scent of winter and deep friend things lingering on his skin.   
  
Arthur slowly relaxed, muscle unspooling tangibly and Eames smiled, cuddled Arthur that little bit closer and drifted away into sleep, because nothing  _ really _ could be wrong if Arthur was here, safe, and warm, and possibly, maybe okay with Eames giving him a morning blowjob. Maybe. Eames could hope.

  
  


66

Arthur didn't sleep immediately. Eames began snuffling softly, not quite snoring, but the lingering threat that said if he ever had a cold he'd be going like a chainsaw train. A train made out of chainsaws. Eames was a steady, hot presence along his back, not sweaty, exactly, but impossible to ignore, and Arthur couldn't decide if it was comforting or oppressive. Usually he'd been on the outside, Mal's warm presence against his belly, or maybe Dom, if it happened to be his birthday. So this was new, and...strange.   
  
He shifted and looked at Cigar who was gnawing a little on the fur at the end of his tail, foot twitching and Arthur pressed his face into the unfamiliar, slightly too flat pillow, and twitched his feet against the unfamiliar texture of the linens.   
  
Dom and Mal had gone from meeting to dating to married so seamless that Arthur couldn't even pick out, exactly, when one had happened, or how, or why. They'd just sort of been and neither of them had looked like it required much thought or conversation. But then, Mal had been expansive and romantic and given to expansive romanticness, and Dom was the sort to love quietly and fiercely and forever. He still had all of his toys from when he was a child, he  _ did not let things go _ . Here they had Eames, who...was...completely ridiculous and romantic, and had none of Mal's larger-than-life elegance.   
  
What did you even  _ do _ with a person like that? Who was just... Maybe if he were himself however many years ago, and Eames had come bashing in with all the seizure power of that one episode of Pokemon that got all the new reports, and all the enthusiasm of Swedish bubblegum pop music, with a thick coating of gruffness that made everything that much easier to swallow. Not wholly sweet, not  _ really _ , but maybe if Eames had arrived  _ then _ -   
  
But he wouldn't have had time for Eames then.   
  
Arthur slowly rolled over, until Eames was curled up around his stomach, sluggishly settling himself until comfortable and sighing into Arthur's armpit and wrapping his free arm up and around him with a hum. He didn't wake up, properly, and after a moment he was fully asleep again and Arthur could have a look at him.   
  
Nothing about Eames' physicality was a problem. He was broad and solid and threw off heat like it was confetti at a parade, his hair was soft and thick and scruffy near his temple, and when he smiled (which was often) he just looked so damn  _ happy _ , which was an inane redundancy, but just stupidly and continuously true.   
  
It was hard to sleep without his [ sleep playlist](http://8tracks.com/guilty/the-list) . He had his iPod, but it was far away in his coat, and as pleasant as being warm and held again in a bed that smelled like pheromones ("Scent of a man," Mal used to say with a sigh, sniffing Dom's neck for comedic value.) and allspice, it was hard to focus on falling asleep without it.   
  
Instead he had the soft huff of Eames and the occasional snort from Cigar and the ambient noises that he rather weren't.   
  
He did want to keep someone just for him.   
  
Tomorrow he'd have to get up earlier, eat breakfast that wasn't one of his bagels (unless Eames had some), and get Cigar home before he got too hungry, feed him, get dressed, go down and make sure the ice cream machine was working, help Yusuf prep the custard and flavor batches, get all the tiny cups and spoons ready for the kids, the napkins and make sure the soap in the bathroom was full, he'd have to get in character and...

  
  


67

He did, eventually, end up sleeping, but not a restful deep sleep. It was more of a drowse with the clear and solid knowledge that he wasn't in his bed, and his playlist wasn't going, and there was a tangled, fanged, uneasiness churning in his stomach.   
  
Eames mumbled in his sleep and his hand moved from flopping on the bed to resting on Arthur's stomach and stroking the skin, just a bit and Arthur didn't even know what to do with that.   
  
"'t sleep darling...'morning..." Eames mumbled, and subsided, not  _ even awake _ and Arthur kissed his head, quick and feeling foolish, but he slowly extracted himself and grabbed his iPod and caught Eames looking at him, blinking languidly and he simply lifted his arm and the covers when Arthur got back in.   
  
"Need music to sleep, mm?" Eames asked and Arthur scooted closer, avoiding waking up Cigar. Cigar would, on occasion, wake up around two AM, and romp around a little before going back to bed. If he was in Arthur's bed, he'd explore the hills and valleys of the sheets, occasionally nibbling on Arthur's toes, before tiring of the lack of anything to do and going back to sleep. "I'll make a note of it."   
  
"What?" Arthur whispered, "Arthur likes falling asleep to music?"   
  
"I'll build you a speaker system all around the room, so you can go to bed practically dripping it, smothered in all those things you love." Eames hummed as Arthur put one earbud in and Eames pulled him down and kissed the free ear as Explosions In The Sky began playing. "I'll put you in a warm bath of sound every single night if it will help you sleep better."   
  
"You're probably terrible with putting things together."   
  
"I don't know, I'm a big, strong, man, and you'll read me the instructions. You are so very good at telling me what to do." Eames smiled up at him, and kissed his chest.   
  
Arthur had a comment for that, something like "How do you talk through that much sap?" or the like, but it seemed so easy, just then, to let it go and relax down and slowly move his face to the crook of Eames neck and let every inhale draw him closer to sleep. Eames stretched out on his back, tucking Arthur to him like he was a blanket or something and Arthur went.   
  
"Go to sleep, I'll make crepes in the morning."   
  
"Chicken crepes?"   
  
"Chicken rosemary crepes with a cranberry orange syrup." Eames promised, clearly exhausted. "And I'll have time to do this, because when we get up again, you're going to let me blow you back to being a hedonistic lay-about."   
  
"Cigar," Arthur protested.   
  
"Cigar will be safety outside having adventures in my living room. Now sleep and stop fretting."   
  
"I'm  _ not _ fretting."   
  
"Like a guitar." Eames yawned, without sympathy. "If you don't start sleeping immediately I'll have to make you warm milk and pat your bum."   
  
"What?"   
  
"I read a thing once that said having your bum patted makes it easier to sleep because it reminds one of being in the womb with the heartbeat and somesuch. I don't know if it's true, but I'm willing to experiment. For science." He settled a hand low on Arthur's back, under the shirt and Arthur tried not to shudder. Eames hands were warm and strong, and he pressed Arthur that smidgen of a distance closer.   
  
It was easy to fall asleep then, warm and cradled and his chest full of something bright and intangible and the familiar notes and beats of his sleep playlist filtering in slow and easy Eames rubbing his back like sleep was a place and Eames could just open the door and guide him in, or something equally ridiculous and fraught with cliches and nonetheless inexpressibly true.   
  
Arthur wanted someone for himself.

  
  


68

Arthur had to wake up early for his job, but that was just to open up, and his job was just downstairs of his home so it wasn’t like he had to factor in a commute time. Eames had to get up before dawn even considered cracking the sky open. Technically Saturday was one of the few days he had to sleep in for a bit, seeing as they opened late and generally had pretty consistent but low volume business trickling and out most of the day. He still had to go in and made the daily breads (other baked goods could last a day or two after baking, but breads needed to be made fresh every single day.) but he had time to rise before Arthur, slide quietly out of bed and pick up an excitedly awake Cigar and go into the kitchen to make crepes.   
  
Eames took a whisk from the large ceramic pot of utensils—all clean and well maintained and easy to access when he was at the stove and needed something just then—and set about melting the butter in the heavy-bottomed skillet as he heated up the already cooked shredded chicken tossed in a light marinade of olive oil, balsamic, poppy seeds and rosemary and the rice he’d cooked was resting in the pot.   
  
Cigar clambered over his feet and ate pieces of untreated chicken off the floor with the gusto of a starving man.   
  
“Cigar you are quite literally underfoot and I am worried about smashing you.”   
  
Cigar looked up and panted at him, then, went back to sniffing Eames foot. Eames reached into the small attached pantry and pulled out a waist-apron. It had plenty of pockets for when he was doing many things at once, and Cigar fit nicely into one of them. He scrambled around in the space Eames usually put a spatula-wide and not too deep, before flopping his head over the side and looking around.   
  
He flipped the crepes onto a plate and quickly packed a line of chicken and rice down the middle, folding them closed with practiced ease and drizzling some of the leftover marinade—reduced, slightly, over the stove—before putting everything in the sink and leaving Cigar to play in the living room. Hopefully he didn’t have to go out or anything, but he seemed invested in a pair of Eames’ wellies and so Eames left well enough alone.   
  
Eames shut the bedroom door behind him and placed the plate down on the bedside before curling up around the sleepy sprawl and his One True Pillow that he was all up on, face smashed into where Eames’ head had been, arms tucked up under his head, as he slept, legs sprawled across the bed like he wanted Eames to crouched between them and pulled the covers down and molested that wide stretch of skin between the top of Arthur’s boxer briefs and the bottom of Eames’ shirt.   
  
But there was only one proper way to wake up a sleepy, adorable Arthur in his bed. Only one manner that could possibly sum up all the things he  _ wanted _ to do. Only one action that would really do the moment  _ justice _ .   
  
Arthur flailed awake and scrambled to the headboard, awake from Eames hands pressed to his belly with a, “Jesus  _ fuck _ your hands are cold.”   
“Always are in the mornings, I’m afraid.” Eames agreed and Arthur ducked away from Eames trying to get his hands against Arthur’s warm belly again. Eames caught him around the waist and Arthur kneed him in the stomach before grabbing the pillow and smacking Eames over the head with it.   
  
Eames held up his hands and Arthur scowled at him, hair sticking up like it was trying to go to space in follicle fueled rocket ships and a scowl firmly affixed to his face.   
  
“I brought breakfast.” Eames pointed. Arthur chanced a look and then scooted closer, sniffing the dish.   
  
“Where’s Cigar?”   
  
“He’s in the living room, meeting my shoes.”   
  
“He does like new shoes.” Arthur murmured, clearly still not-wholly awake and investigating the meal, taking the fork and cut a neat slice off the end before humming in surprise as shredded chicken and rice tumbled out. He speared the buttery, thin crepe and a good portion of the chicken, but the rice tumbled out and there wasn’t much he could do about it. He ate it with a few considering chews before taking the plate and settling down against the headboard.

  
  


69

“Come here.” Arthur said and Eames moved forward, because that was never a hardship.   
  
“Lie on your back over my lap.” Arthur said, cutting off another curl, and this time scooping up the nutty-brown rice cooked in half chicken stock and half water. Eames frowned, but settled down, back curling over Arthur’s thighs. Arthur flipped his apron up over his stomach and put the plate down. Eames took a pillow to put under his head and watched as Arthur ate.   
  
“Don’t I get any?” Eames asked, moving to put his dangling feet up on the nightstand and Arthur glanced at him, considered it, then shook his head.   
  
“You are truly the best of all guests.”   
  
“Oh I am,” Arthur agreed, after a swallow. “Do you want to know why?” Arthur asked.   
  
“Why are you the best guest ever who steals the covers and won’t share breakfast?” Eames asked, hands loose and resting on his chest. He could always eat something at the bakery, he wasn’t overly worried, but this conversation had the delightful fission of a game, and Eames (thus far) had enjoyed Arthur’s games. Even if they generally meant he lacked something crucial, like his shoes, or an orgasm, or breakfast. He liked the empty spaces, honestly, added a sense of balance to the entire thing. “Oh and whose little dog apparently wants to be smashed to bits?”   
  
“He’s used to being held. When I first got him he was too small to be out on his own, so I carried him around in a sock around my neck until he got big enough to navigate rugs.” Arthur ate another neat bite, and licked the balsamic reduction of hiss lips. “But, the reason why I’m the best guest ever, is that while you are kind enough to be breakfast tray, I am going to give you a handjob. However if you are rude and make it difficult for me to eat, by, say, breathing too hard, I will stop until you calm down. If you knock my plate off, I will stop entirely.”   
  
“I get paid for my services as host, chef and tray with a handjob?”   
  
“In this economy it’s the best you can expect.” Arthur replied, eating another bite.   
  
“No insurance plan?” Eames huffed, settling in. “No 401k? I’m pretty sure I could shop around and find something better.”   
  
“I doubt it, but you’re welcome to try. Also, if you come in my food I will hurt you.” Arthur settled his hand on Eames thigh, fingers under the edge of his boxers and Eames snorted before moving one leg and letting it dangle off the bed.   
  
“How about upward mobility?” Eames asked. “Does this position offer a flexible schedule? I really need to consider my options here, as a responsible employee.”   
  
Arthur crept another few fingers in under the leg of his boxer shorts and stroked Eames’ skin like he had some many plans and so little time to enact any of them.   
  
“If you shut up and stop making puns and let me eat, I’ll be your boyfriend.” Arthur caught a scoop of rice and ate it like this was happening at a dinner table and they were talking about something boring. Stocks. Baseball. Something.   
  
“I feel manipulated.” Eames spread out his arms. “Is this a hallmark of how our relationship is going to go?”   
  
“Do you secretly not actually have a penis?” Arthur asked, “because you seem very against me getting you off.”   
  
Eames watched him and Arthur smoothed his hand as nonchalantly as one could to the fly of his pants. “It  _ feels _ like you have one.”   
  
Eames breath hitched as Arthur—who had actually finished eating at this point, but looked unwilling to give up his game—slipped a hand inside, stroking hot skin, watching Eames with his head cocked. “Feels like skin, even.”   
  
“Yes, I do have a dick, and I feel it has been very patient and deserves some attention for it.”   
  
“Does it now?”   
  
Eames nodded and Arthur continued to stroke him with his knuckles, far too light to be any sort of satisfying, just a slow, friction tease and a sense of  _ finally _ that was zeroing in.

  
  


70

“Lift up.” Arthur said, and after not-even-slightly graceful maneuvering they got his pants down, and then the fact they weren’t all the way off bothered Arthur’s since of justice, or cleanliness, or order, or whatever, and then Arthur laughed when Eames got caught and Eames end up rolling over, spilling rice and the plate onto his bed and Arthur tried to help him, but the boxers, at some point had decided they wanted to chemically bond with his knees and weren’t leaving for any amount of love or money.   
  
“New rule,” Eames said, when they’d gotten them off and thrown them across the room, “no kinky sex games before coffee.”   
  
Arthur nodded in agreement brushing rice away from himself and then climbed on top of Eames. “But we’re still having sex, right?”   
  
“Nothing too complicated, I have to be at work in another hour and a half.” Eames stretched out on the not-messy portion of the bed and they struggled to get Arthur’s pants off (much more easily done than Eames’. Apparently Eames’ pants were the clingy sort and Arthur’s pants wanted to explore the world, or something) and Eames pulled Arthur down and Arthur just went, not laughing, but easily.   
  
“Hold on,” He said, scooting down Arthur raised body, and Arthur rolled to the side to make it easier. Eames got a hand on his hip and nipped the jut of Arthur’s hipbone, grinned at the twist of Arthur’s body at just that simple, easy action, before pulling Arthur into his mouth. Frottage seemed like a good morning activity; easy, slippery, moving against Arthur until one of them just shuddered apart, before getting up properly.   
  
He pulled off once he deemed Arthur cock wet enough, dripping with silvery trails of saliva and pre-come, cock twitching and happily red (Eames was, personally, against  _ angry _ red cocks. Cocks should, in his opinion, be generally affable) and Eames slid back up and fit them together.   
  
The slide hitched but each pass was the sort of shiver-good build that Eames liked so much, he liked frottage because of how many points of contact there were, how the pleasure climbed in a slow, noticeable layers and how Arthur mouthed at his throat like he had a map for Points Of Key Visitation.   
  
He bit down as he came, right along the muscle and Eames wasn’t really sure which act preceded which, but Arthur jerked, body sliding, skin slick and come dripping off both their stomachs and Eames moved up so his cock could drag through the mess rather then Arthur’s softening dick. Arthur panted over the wet patches he’d left of Eames’ skin, hand gripping his arm and warm and tight and pressed against him everywhere.   
  
“If we’re boyfriends does that mean we can fuck more?” he asked and Arthur huffed.   
  
“Just fucking come already,” Arthur ordered. “You can impress me with your stamina later.” Eames was never one to disappoint, especially when Arthur was watching him with smug, silted eyes and his body was loose and warm and covered in  _ everything _ and he was being a bossy little punk that Eames was going to revenge on so hard later.   
  
Though Arthur sort of paid the bluff as he seemed reluctant to move for a bit, coming down before rolling away and taking Eames shirt off the rest of the way and wiping them both off with it, without even a hint of reluctance to abuse Eames clothing. Not that Eames was surprised.   
  
“I need to get back to mine to feed Cigar,” Arthur said after a stretch and began tugging on his clothing from the previous night and Eames watched him. “See you tonight?” Like it was obvious he would, and Eames liked that. That things were now obvious for them.   
  
“See a movie or something.” Arthur shrugged.   
  
“Yeah.” Eames agreed, then tugged on a robe to see them out, Cigar retrieved from Eames’ wellies and put back into his bag. Arthur tugged him down for a kiss. “You know when I get off work.”   
  
“I may have your daily schedule slightly memorized, yes.” Eames kissed him again, because he was there, and he was going to be there tonight, and that was just…it was perfect. It was a  _ guarantee _ . No more wagers, tonight he’d go to Arthur’s place, and Arthur would be there.   
  
Eames watched him go before closing his door as the elevator went down and away, the flick of floors settling on one and going dark.   
  
**End**


End file.
